A Divine Intervention
by MamaLaz
Summary: Lucius Malfoy is the evil new Minister of Magic, Harry Potter and Hermione Granger are two angels fighting to get back to earth and Ron Weasley has ‘kidnapped’ Draco Malfoy in a fit of insanity… RD Slash based loosely on 'A Life Less Ordinary'.
1. The Morning of the Worst Day

_**Title:** Divine Intervention_

_**Pen Name:** MamaLaz_

_**Rating:** R_

_**Any Relationship Pairings:** Ron/Draco_

_**Email Address: Summary:** Lucius Malfoy is the evil new Minister of Magic, Harry Potter and Hermione Granger are two angels fighting to get back to earth and Ron Weasley has 'kidnapped' Draco Malfoy in a fit of insanity… Based loosely on A Life Less Ordinary._

_**Spoilers:** PS/SS, CoS, PoA, GoF, OotP_

_**Disclaimer:** The Harry Potter universe is not mine. I don't own it. The nice blonde lady does._

_**Notes:** Every time 'He' with a capital H is mentioned, the deity in question is God :)_

_**Warning:** My Draco is a foul-mouthed thing; sorry if this offends._

* * *

**-------------------------------------------------**

**The Morning of the Worst Day**

**-------------------------------------------------**

It was, without a doubt, the worst day of Harry Potter's life.

Well, it was the worst day of Harry Potter's life since Harry Potter's death two months ago.

Running his fingers through his hair, which appeared to be messy in every plane of existence, Harry placed his hand flat along the fingerprint panel of the _Heavenly Gate_'s elevator and waited to be scanned.

Blinking drearily as a harp-like melody rang with verification and an overly-friendly female voice happily chirped "Good morning, Mr Potter!" at him, the fluid doors soon cascaded down in a fountain of water and the gaudy gold lift began to gently rise.

Stifling a yawn, Harry reluctantly placed his hat on his head and looked about the mirrored interior of the elevator dully, his reflection looking just as grimly back at him.

A rumpled white suit. A creased white shirt. A lopsided white tie. A white bowler hat. A pair of white shoes.

Harry, in his own honest opinion, looked like a pimp.

Grimacing at the rings under his eyes and running a hand over the stubble he had forgotten to shave that morning, Harry momentarily wondered why The Powers That Be couldn't have chosen a more original colour scheme for his uniform.

White was such a bitch to get stains out of.

"The Third Floor!" the disembodied, chirpy voice sounded again as the lift came to a halt. The watery door, giving in to gravity, fell with a splash at Harry's feet then evaporated. "Have a perfect day, Mr Potter…!"

Harry, who very much doubted he would, winced at the glaring white light that assaulted his vision as soon as the liquid door gave way, instantly blinded.

Damn those angels. They really were all for the dramatics.

Tipping his hat so the majority of the light struck the brim, Harry let out a heavy, melancholic sigh and slumped his way through the weaving, sterile white floor, the noises of buzzing chatter, computer keys and the hum of machinery washing around him.

Harry didn't need to look up to know what it all looked like.

Bare white walls, minimalist white furniture and white clad people.

The _Heavenly Gate_'s headquarters were hardly the most welcoming place on the plane. The people here had an ethereal glow about them, smiled too much and ended all their communications with "God Bless You!".

Cold efficiency was their number one priority.

Well, number two, after security.

And Harry would know all about security; he'd been stationed to that division of the _Gate _ever since its system malfunctioned and accidentally killed him in his sleep 8 weeks before.

But that was a different story.

Letting out a loud, long yawn and blearily wiping his red eyes with the back of his hand, Harry seriously began to contemplate a change of occupation.

He was so _sick_ of security.

Only last week did he have to deal with a group of Spanish martyrs who blew themselves up only to realise that all persons who ticked the 'Did Myself In' box in their Circumstances of Death form went straight to hell.

The group of Spaniards, who were furious, were still appealing the decision, Lucifer, who was always delighted to rake in fresh meat, was still postponing their appeal date by a century, and Gabriel, who always complained about his workload, was still complaining to anyone who would listen about all the extra paperwork postponed appeals featuring Spanish martyrs created.

Harry, who was actually the one lumbered with all the paperwork, personally didn't know what all the fuss was about. He couldn't see how an eternity in hell could be any worse than his life at present.

Someone, somewhere, Harry was sure, was conspiring against him.

He'd been sure for a whole week that it had been Gilbert from Finance due this shifty looking eyes and his rather odd case of the shakes until someone informed Harry that the iris twitch was a souvenir from the accountant's rather gruesome death two decades aback.

Lowering his head and trying not to make eye contact with any of the workers at their small white workstations, Harry continued to brood, even as he reached his destination at the very end of the room. Passing the rather grand-looking Fountain of Prosperity (which doubled as a water cooler during the hot summer months), Harry slumped his way over to the familiar figure who was busily getting on with her work in the far corner of the room.

Hermione Granger, who was sitting at her white desk, writing with her white stationary and leaning forward on her white chair, looked up from the parchment she was writing on and lowered her quill as he approached.

Pursing her lips, she looked disapproving.

"You look terrible," she said, her keen eyes travelling up the creases on his suit and the stains on his shirt. "Gabriel will kill you if he sees you looking like that. Honestly, Harry. You know we've got to set a good example for as long as we're here. We can't have the other choirs picking up on it. The Watchers have been well… _watching_ our department rather closely… Trying to hone in on our mistakes… It's almost turning into a competition. Really, you'd never think angels could be so petty…"

"Do you know why He wants to see us?" Harry cut in, feeling drained already as he collapsed into the nearest seat, eased off his hat and then plopped it on her desk

Eying his hair, Hermione's fingers twitched to comb it.

"I haven't a clue," she replied. "It might be another rehash of our security measures, but I think He's more than confident with our changes... Although, Ichabod from Underworld Relations did stress that the print system malfunctioned on him a few times last week. Apparently, it didn't recognise him, booted him outside the Gates and he had to wait on the steps for about an hour for someone to let him back in. You didn't have a problem getting in today, did you?"

"No," Harry replied glumly, wishing that he had.

Hermione, watching his forlorn expression shrewdly, paused for a minute and, looking slightly apprehensive, hesitantly opened her mouth.

"You don't think this meeting means He's finally sending us home, do you?"

"No, I don't," Harry replied in a clipped tone.

Hermione, who up until that moment had looked stern and controlled, finally let her guard slip as her face fell in sadness.

"Oh, Harry," she said, her eyes softening. "He _will_ send us back eventually. I'm positive of it. He's just a very busy deity, that's all, especially now with all that business in the Middle East and Voldemort's second rising. And He did make us a promise… I mean, really, if we're going to blame anyone for this whole mess, it's the old administration. Their organisation was appalling. Apparently, Cornelius Fudge was supposed to die eight years ago from a brush with a Venomous Tentacular and Bertha Jorkins was accidentally summoned here a century early and…"

Hermione's voice trailed off at the way Harry was looking at her. She bit her lip.

"We will return back home, Harry. I know it."

"Don't hold your breath…" Harry muttered then, thinking about what he just said, added, "… if you had any left, that is."

Hermione, who had opened her mouth to remark how tasteless and insensitive that was, was suddenly interrupted by the arrival of a snowy white dove. Swooping down beside them, the bird looked at them briefly, dropped a crisp roll of white parchment onto Hermione's desk, crooned and then flew off.

Looking at one another curiously as the bird vacated, Hermione reached over and snatched the parchment before Harry did. Then untying the ribbon around it, laying the parchment flat on the table and reading a few sentences, she frowned.

"He's had to cancel our meeting…" she said slowly, her eyes still scanning the paper. "Problems in the Underworld that He's had to deal with personally. It must be those pesky demons trying to sneak in again, Gabriel did mention that he saw one of them trying to bug the security system the other day. And Lucifer is such a Nazi about who he negotiates with…"

Harry grunted. He knew that well enough. The tyrant downstairs had flatly refused to see Harry when he had tried to conduct one of his routine security inspections last week. Harry later found out that Voldemort was Lucifer's second cousin a couple of millennia removed and it seemed that even The Morning Star was a firm supporter of family loyalty.

Hermione furrowed her brows and scrutinized the parchment as she turned it over primly.

"He's attached our next mission," she informed, still running her eyes over the parchment. "It looks rather long and wordy but if we complete this successfully we… oh, Harry, we get to go back to _earth_. This is it, the owl we've been waiting for these past months…! We finally get our lives back! Isn't this such wonderful news? We can see Ron again! And you can continue your Auror training! Oh, I really am so… _oh_."

" '_Oh?'_" Harry repeated almost hysterically, having scooted to the edge of his seat in his excitement and nearly slipped off of it at the change of tone in Hermione's voice. "What do you mean '_oh'?_ _Oh _what?"

Lifting up her bushy head, her eyes wide and her face pale, Hermione silently passed the parchment to Harry.

Snatching the paper, Harry impatiently made his way through the perfect gold calligraphy of the message. However, he had only got to the second paragraph of the mission statement when he started to feel woozy.

Looking back up at Hermione, Harry then blinked.

"Bugger," he said.

**-------------------------------------------------**

It was, without a doubt, the worst day of Ron Weasley's life.

Well, it was the worst day of Ron Weasley's life since waking up to find his two best friends stone dead in their beds.

No, that hadn't been a good day at all.

And this one wasn't shaping up to be much better.

"But you can't bloody fire us!"

"Mr Weasley, please don't make this harder than it has to be…"

"But you've got no reason for doing it!"

"Ron…"

"No, dad! We can't let them get away with this! Our Department's had the best results out of any in the Ministry and we actually make a difference! Why isn't McNally's section being made redundant? They're useless!"

"Mr Weasley, please try to understand…"

Ron Weasley, who was bright red, absolutely fuming and standing in the middle of the now empty Misuse of Muggle Artefacts Office, was hardly in the most understanding of moods.

"Why?" he hissed through clenched teeth, his blue eyes narrowed and his freckles completely obscured under his scarlet complexion. "Just answer us that, _why_? My dad's offered twenty years of good service to the Ministry and now, all of a sudden, you're cutting him loose?"

Irvin Fletcher, the wiry assistant to the new Minister of Magic, let out a dry cough and pushed his horn-rimmed frames up the bridge of his long, thin nose. Looking rather uneasy under Ron's fuming gaze, he shuffled the official-looking papers in his bony hands and briefly averted his eyes.

"Unfortunately, Minister Malfoy can see no future for this department," he stated rather primly, occasionally darting a wary look at Ron in case he exploded into a fitful of rage and throttled him. "That being the case, your services are no longer required."

Ron let out a snort so heavy with disdain that it made both the assistant and the form in his hand flinch.

"The 'Minister'," Ron spat in disgust, his fists clenched tight, "is a bigoted bastard who hates our family and doesn't care a newt's eye about what happens to Muggles. This is just a personal vendetta that Malfoy has against us, and we're not about to just sit back and let him get away with this. We'll go to the Wizengamot if we have to, sort this out with Dumbledore. I don't care if Lucius Malfoy's king of the sodding world, he can't dissolve an entire department like this, it's illegal…! Right, dad? Dad…?"

Ron, who had turned to his father fiercely for support, blinked at the weary look Arthur Weasley was wearing.

Mr Weasley, already thin-faced and slightly wrinkled, looked incredibly lined and suddenly very tired, as though he had aged a decade in the last few minutes. Ron, who was gaping at his father like a fish out of water, gaped further still when Mr Weasley placed a weak hand on his shoulder.

"Let's just go home, son," he said in a resigned voice, his eyes tired and bloodshot behind his thin spectacles. He then, before Ron even had a chance to respond, shakily pulled out a quill from his tatty work robe and leaned his thin frame over to sign the form in Fletcher's hand. Then giving the assistant a brief nod and patting his son mildly on the arm, Mr Weasley turned and walked out of the room.

Ron who watched all of this mutely with his mouth hanging open, stood in the middle of the once busy office and stared after his father in incredulity.

At that moment in time, witnessing the utter defeat in his father's eyes, his once messy desk pristinely empty and Lucius sodding Malfoy's portrait smirking at him from where it sat on the wall, Ron truly thought that his day couldn't get any worse.

Unfortunately for him, it did.

"But you can't dispossess my house!" Ron cried out an hour later outside Thatched Roof cottage, the small country lodge he had shared with Harry and Hermione. Looking in horror at the half-dozen or so wizards exiting and entering the place and hurling the majority of his belongings into a skip-like cauldron in the front lawn, Ron gaped at the rotund gentleman beside him.

Terrence Mimblewood, with his huge walrus-moustache and sizeable belly, sniffed pompously.

"Mr Weasley, please don't make this harder than it has to be…"

"But you've got no reason for doing it!" Ron exclaimed emphatically, flapping his arms uselessly at his sides.

"Mr Weasley," Mimblewood said lazily, his cruel, aristocratic brogue slow and uncaring. "You are two months overdue on your rent and have three outstanding Ministry bills."

"What are you _on_ about?" Ron shouted in furious exasperation, trying his hardest not to let out a banshee-scream of frustration. "I already paid all that rubbish!"

"Indeed," the ruddy-faced Mimblewood snorted as he peered at the clipboard in his hand, adjusting his monocle with his short podgy fingers. "And so you did – with the funds of one Harry James Potter."

Ron blanched slightly.

"Harry… he… he left his estate to me!" Ron protested, his face suddenly pink with embarrassment. "I was going to pay him back anyway. I mean, it's not like I even wanted… I was desperate –"

"Be that as it may," Mimblewood said loudly over Ron's words, his booming tone drowning out the redhead's voice. "But the Ministry's new passing (listed under Section No. 6788987 of the recent Financial Manifesto) decrees that all large transactions be initialled and signed by the account holder before the transfer can be complete – _no_ exceptions. The Department of Records have no signed confirmation, following Mr Potter's death, of his intention to leave you his estate, therefore your use of his funds are illegal."

"But Harry's dead!" Ron burst out in frustration, wondering if the whole world had gone mad. "How's he supposed to sign anything to me when he's dead!"

"Mr Weasley, that is not my problem," Mimblewood drawled. "However, I am happy to say that in the event of such a situation, all outstanding funds are filtered back into government circulation, helping the new administration to help _you._"

"You mean they're filtered back in to line Lucius Malfoy's pockets!" Ron spat out in disgust. "That corrupt, evil _bastard!_ He can't do this! It's not fair!"

"No, it's _politics_," Mimblewood said with a dry smile, before thrusting the clipboard towards Ron. "Now, if you'll just sign sections 3, 4, 8 and simply initial section 11, we can proceed."

"Sod off, I'm not signing anything," Ron growled, shoving the clipboard from under his nose and crossing his arms over his chest like a petulant child, "And you can't make me."

Looking initially taken back, his monocled eye looking huge as it blinked in surprise, Mimblewood soon recovered from the shock to let out a heavily amused snort, his breath ruffling his huge moustache.

"I see," he said, a rumbling chuckle emitting from somewhere under his vast chest. He then made a gesture with his hand and two rather familiar man-mountains soon lumbered at his side. "Well, perhaps Misters Crabbe and Goyle here can be more convincing…"

Ron, who hadn't seen either one of the Slytherins since school, felt himself going pale when he noticed the manic grins on their faces, the huge fists they were eagerly punching into their hands and the fact they looked ten times larger than they had at Hogwarts.

He let out a very loud gulp.

"Bugger," he said.

**-------------------------------------------------**

It was, without a doubt, the worst day of Draco Malfoy's life.

Well, it was the _only_ bad day Draco Malfoy had ever had in his life up until now so, naturally, it was the worst.

Squirming away from the overly zealous hands that were groping at him rather enthusiastically, Draco hissed out a string of profanities so vulgar that they would have made even Lord Voldemort blush.

"You stupid cow, Parkinson, get the hell _off _me," Draco sneered, trying to slap the hand on his crotch away and berating himself for not being able to throw off a relatively skinny girl.

Pansy, whose lip-gloss seemed to have smudged itself all over Draco's cheeks when she was (as he would deem it) raping his face, lifted up her curly blonde head and pouted.

"Draco, I really do hope you'll get over this prudery when we're married."

"For the last fuckiing time, we are _not_ getting married," Draco spat and, seeing his chance, pushed her off of him so she fell off of his four-poster bed and into a pink and frilly heap on the ground.

Rising to his own feet importantly and haughtily dusting his designer robes as though she had somehow contaminated them, Draco placed his hands on his hips and scowled down at her. Pansy, from her place on the marble floor, scowled just as prissily back.

"Draco, you know perfectly well that your father's already approved our wedding," she said. Draco, who watched her struggle to get back to her feet, her face pink and her pug nose glowing, offered no assistance as she continued. "You _can't_ back out now. Our families are planning the ceremony as we speak. Your father has already dished out a cauldronful of money, I've already confirmed to my tutors that I'm setting aside my Healer training and your mother has already chosen the perfect hat for the occasion – and you know how long it takes for her to actually like something. _Everything _has been planned. The sooner you accept it, the better it will be for us all."

Growling as he stepped forward towards her, Draco would have felt a lot more imposing a figure had Pansy not had two inches over him. As it was, he tiptoed slightly and put on his most malicious of faces to make up the difference. It made his nose itch though.

"You had better get this through your thick skull, Parkinson," he hissed, making sure to spit on her as much as humanly possible, "because I'm not going to say it again – I don't like you. I've _never_ liked you. And I'm never going to _start _liking you, despite how many methods of excruciating torture and/or death my father threatens me with. When I choose a wife, I'll choose someone with at least half a brain and unfortunately for you, you don't happen to qualify. Now keep your filthy little hands away from me, get the hell out of my room and for the love of Slytherin, do something about that nose of yours. Now _out._"

Pansy, her eyes narrowed and her lips pursed, looked almost dangerous.

"You'll regret that, Malfoy," she sneered, the two bright pink spots on her cheeks indicating just how offended she really was. They made Draco smirk even wider.

"Oh, I'm _sure_ I will," he drawled sarcastically, giving her a lazy grin. Then lifting a perfectly manicured thumb, he made a jabbing motion over his shoulder and towards the door behind him. "_Out_."

Smiling as she strode furiously out of the room and slammed the door behind her, Draco soon turned to eye himself in the mirror, easily falling into preoccupation with his reflection and feeling not a worry in the world.

Unfortunately for Draco, the feeling didn't last.

"… Master Draco, sir?" came a tentative voice just five minutes later.

"What is it, you plebeian?" Draco snapped at the house-elf who had rudely interrupted him from the very important task of studying his eyebrows. "Can't you see I'm busy looking at myself?"

Raising a hand to fix his fringe before smirking and lowering it when he realised it couldn't be improved, Draco turned on his heel, leaned idly against the wall and then made an airy gesture with his hand as he sighed.

"Ugh, fine. What is it?"

"It… it is Master Lucius, Master Draco, sir," the elf squeaked as it shivered under his glare, the teacups on its tray rattling. "He is wishing to see you, sir. He is wishing to see you at Malfoy Enterprises in fifteen minutes, sir. He is wishing to talk to you about the wedding with Miss Parkinson, sir. He is wishing to tell you something important."

Draco, who had turned back to the mirror above his fireplace, stared back into his own worried-looking grey eyes at the elf's words.

_He is wishing to talk to you about the wedding with Miss Parkinson, sir… He is wishing to tell you something important…_

Letting out a groan, Draco squeezed shut his eyes.

"Bugger," he said.


	2. Midday of the Worst Day

**-----------------------------------------**

**Midday of the Worst Day**

**-----------------------------------------**

When Lavender Brown opened her door and saw what was standing on the doorstep, she let out a horrified scream so piercing that it made her neighbours crane their heads from over the tops their fences to see what all the ruckus was about.

"Bloody hell, keep it down, would you?" Ron muttered, ears going red at all the attention he was receiving. Wincing with pain, he tried to hobble as quickly as he could passed her and into the sanctity of her apartment before he caught any more of old Mrs-Next-Door's curious glances.

"What happened to you?" Lavender gasped, her hand clutched to her mouth and her eyes wide with dismay as she followed close at his heels. "You look like you've been in a fight with a troll!"

Wiping his bloody lip with the back of his hand, Ron spat out a tooth.

"Yeah, a couple of 'em…" he said raspily, hissing with pain as he lowered himself onto a lilac sofa. Lifting up a battered leg with two hands and draping it painfully over his knee, he then let out a huge groan, dropped his head overdramatically on the back of the couch and waited for the reprove from his girlfriend that was just bound to come.

However, strangely enough, it didn't.

"Um, Ron, look, could you come back in about half an hour?"

Lifting up his head, Ron blinked at her.

"Huh?"

"I mean, it's just that…" Lavender looked slightly flustered as she ran her fingers through her rather dishevelled looking – dishevelled? – hair. "Well, now really isn't a great time."

Ron grunted.

"You're telling me. I think they broke my nose…"

"Ron, _please_," she said with a tad more desperation in her voice. "Just give me a half hour to… just, you know, freshen myself up for you."

Now, despite what some people would say about how dense Ron could be, he did notice some things, even with his right eye the size of a grapefruit.

Like the fact that Lavender was strangely mussed up for someone as immaculate as she usually was. And the way her bedroom door was closed when Lavender always insisted on keeping it open for airflow. And that really was a very strange bruise on her neck, considering the fact Ron was never a hickey man. And was that oddly-familiar snakeheaded cane supposed to be resting against the armrest he was leaning on like that?

It took a few minutes for the penny to drop but, when it did, Ron's jaw joined it.

"Oh God," he croaked.

**-----------------------------------------**

In his previous lifetime, when an unpleasant moment arose, Harry would either wish for death to strike him down in a quick yet painless way or for the floor to open up and swallow him whole. However, now that Harry was more informed with how monotonous the afterlife actually was – in addition to the fact that he was _already _dead – he decided to go for the latter option.

So, squeezing shut his eyes, and hoping against hope, he waited for the ground beneath him to split open and gobble him right up.

However, just as he was sure it almost did so (there was definite vibration under his feet), Hermione let out a huff of exasperation.

"Oh, for heaven's sake Harry, I do wish you'd stop doing that. Now come over here and help me with this."

"I'm not doing it," Harry said stubbornly, crossing his arms over his chest and glowering. "I absolutely, categorically, downright _refuse_ to do it. So there."

Hermione, who was wondering when Harry had regressed back to an eleven-year-old boy, was very tempted to smack him upside the head. Somehow, she held herself back.

"Harry, this isn't negotiable."

"He's my best friend; I'm not doing this to him."

"Harry," Hermione moaned in exasperation, rubbing at her temples. She was suddenly getting a migraine, "we haven't got time for this. And please don't tell me you want to thwart God's will. You know what happens to those who do. Just because He is more amiable now than he used to be, doesn't mean he doesn't have a temper. Although, his sense of humour is unparalleled… look at George Bush."

Harry snorted.

"I'd rather not," he muttered. "Look, how can you be so comfortable with this? Doesn't it bother you that we're going to have to do this to Ron?"

Looking slightly hesitant at that, Hermione briefly worried her lip.

"… it's… it's fate, Harry," she finally answered when she found her voice. "This is going to happen, no matter what we do. Besides, we're only just watching now, not engaging. We don't do anything until they actually meet up. And when they _do_ meet up… well, we're just going to… push them in the right direction."

"Right direction?" Harry scoffed so heatedly that he made a strange gurgling noise, his messy hair fluffing up even more. "How can you call anywhere _near _Draco Malfoy the 'right direction'? Besides, it's supposed to be 'fate' that I kill Voldemort but since I'm stuck being dead up here, I'm not exactly much of a believer anymore. Unless I'm supposed to push Draco Malfoy onto him, as well. Wait, that's an idea…"

"Harry, shush!" Hermione suddenly cried out, making frantic gestures with her hands for Harry to quieten down as she stared down into the strange, pensieve-like device between them that was screening Ron's current movements. "There he is…! Right on schedule! Oh my, what happened to his face?"

"Crabbe and Goyle," Harry said shortly, though he was wincing at the state of Ron's nose. "New administration. He lost the house and his job, too. Cedric sent us a dove when you were getting the paperwork."

Hermione, who looking through said paperwork, nodded with satisfaction.

"Good. All according to plan."

"And… yup," Harry said, tilting his head and closing one eye as he stared down at the scene. "looks like he's finally found out about Lavender."

Peering into the screen, Hermione humphed as she caught sight of Lavender fidgeting with the cuffs of her sleeves.

"_Ron, we're in two different places right now…"_

"_We're in two different planets if you think sleeping with Lucius Malfoy's a good idea!"_

"_Ron, please don't make this harder than it has to be …"_

"_Why is everyone saying that to me today! I'm not the one who dissolved my department! I'm not the one who made up some stupid rule so I can't pay my rent! I'm not the one sleeping with Lucius Malfoy behind my back!"_

"_At least Lucius gives me attention! Ever since Harry and Hermione, you've been distant and uncaring!"_

"_That's not fair!"_ Ron and Harry both yelled in unison. Shushing Harry again, Hermione, and the few dozen people in their department who had drifted their way towards the drama in curiosity, continued to watch, enthralled.

"_That's not the point, Ron!" _Lavender continued harshly. "_You've always put them before me! Even when they were alive, but things weren't ever this bad then! Now they're both gone, all you do is shut yourself in, snap at anyone who talks to you and ignore me completely! I have needs, Ron!"_

Groaning, all the men in the group protested loudly by throwing their popcorn at the screen. Glaring at them all and reminding herself to write a complaint about the amount of litterbugs in the department, Hermione pulled the sticky kernels out of her hair and sniffed before turning back to the scene.

"_So, what are you saying - that it's my fault you fell on your back for the Lord of all Darkness?" _Ron was demanding, his face – Harry personally felt – as red as the fires of hell. Which Harry would know, of course, having seen them firsthand.

Lavender narrowed her eyes at this.

"_I think you should go,"_ she said stiffly, her lips pursed over her teeth in a way that reminded Harry greatly of his Aunt Petunia

"_You're damn right I'm going…!"_ Ron retorted, jumping up onto his feet, then soon regretting it as he almost fell off balance in pain. Miraculously though, he held himself upright long enough to march through the door, slam it shut after him, clench a trembling fist around his wand, lift it up menacingly and hiss, "_I'm coming for you, Malfoy," _before his legs finally gave out and he fell with an 'oof!' to the floor.

Hermione sighed.

"And so it begins…" she said sadly, shaking her head. Looking back at the file in her hand, flicking ahead a few pages and then nodding, Hermione turned her attention back to Harry. "Come on, we have to check on Malfoy. He should be in his father's office by now."

**-----------------------------------------**

Draco Malfoy, fidgeting in the overly large leather chair and turning paler than was physically possible, tried very hard not to have palpitations as Lucius Malfoy glared down at him.

It was difficult, though.

Trying to look as politely interested as he could without looking cross-eyed, Draco was pretty sure that this is what a panic attack felt like.

Stifling a hiccup and running through a thousand excuses in his head (deliberating on which would be the best to use and if bursting into tears would work), he wondered if he could survive a thirty foot drop from Lucius's window and still maintain some of his dignity.

"Nervous, Draco?"

Lucius, with a strange lift of his lips, turned to wander over to the colossal stone fireplace to the side of his desk, which was as tall and as wide as Rubeus Hagrid. Huge flames licked the edges of the hearth higher than Lucius's own head, causing menacing shadows and flickers of light to play across the office.

Draco, repressing a gulp, felt it rude not to answer his father's question.

"No, sir," he said, his voice two octaves higher than normal.

Though he had his back to him, Draco could tell Lucius was smirking.

"Then stop thinking about jumping out the window," Lucius said. Then turning back around and holding Draco's gaze, "That's no way for the new director of Malfoy Industries to behave."

The backs of chairs, Draco suddenly realised, were marvellously useful things because, head reeling, he fell right into his.

"_What?"_ he choked out.

**-----------------------------------------**

Downstairs, about thirty feet below…

"Welcome to the Ministry of Magic, sir, how can I help you?"

"Yeah, I'd like to see the Minister, please," Ron said as he limped over to the receptionist's desk, looking behind her at the golden grille of the lift that led to Malfoy's office and trying not to look too homicidal.

The woman who was situated behind the desk, a pale looking young witch with bright red lipstick, square-rimmed glasses and a tight blonde bun of a hairstyle, ran her sharp, disapproving eyes from Ron's blackened eyes and split lip to his rumpled robes and scruffy shoes. She then let out a slow, patronising smile.

"I'm very sorry, sir," she said, her full red lips quirked. "Minister Malfoy isn't seeing anyone today."

"But I'm here to make a complaint."

Her lips quirked some more.

"Then he _definitely _won't be seeing you, sir," she said.

Already in a very bad mood, Ron scowled, turning redder.

"Look, I _have_ to see him, _now_," he said through clenched teeth.

"I'm sorry, sir, that just isn't possible," she said, smiling once again and looking as though she was taking some strange form of pleasure from this. "He's currently in a _very_ important meeting and simply hasn't the time to see just anyone."

Ron, whose skin was beginning to look unhealthily blotchy, refrained himself from a) pulling out his hair and b) pulling out _her_ hair.

"Oh yeah?" he questioned, leaning forward and looking unstable enough to make the receptionist begin to look slightly wary. "And who the sod's important enough to be up there, then?"

**-----------------------------------------**

"Draco," Lucius said sternly, his shadow looming imposingly over his son, "Now that you're 17, it's time for you to be a man."

"Actually, father, I think you'll find I'm 21…" Draco began to say self-importantly.

"Hush, boy, can't you see I'm talking?"

Cheeks going pink at the reprimand, Draco tried very hard not to sulk.

"Sorry, sir," he muttered resentfully.

"Anyway," Lucius began once again, looking irked at having to repeat himself, "you're 17, Draco. And being 17, you are now considered an adult in the eyes of the law. But no boy can be considered a man unless he proves himself as such. So you, my boy, are finally going to have to grow up." Taking a slight pause to let the words sink in, as well as finding the horror-struck look on his son's face rather amusing, Lucius continued. "You are going to have to learn how to look after yourself, Draco… fend for your family… do a dishonest day's work to take an honest man's pay… And you're going to do all this, Draco, and like doing it. In fact, you're going to like doing it so much that you're going to refuse any outside assistance, such as the _generous_ weekly stipend your mother and I grant you…"

"_What!" _Draco cried out as he jumped to his feet, his mouth hanging open and his eyes wide. "You _can't _do that!"

**-----------------------------------------**

"Sir? Sir…! You _can't _go up there! Security! Security! Sec-"

"SILENCIO!" Ron yelled, haphazardly pointing his wand over his shoulder as his other arm pressed frantically at the lift's 'up' button. Grabbing her throat as the spell hit against it with force, the receptionist stumbled a few steps back and her voice gave out mid-word.

Turning on her heel and sprinting back towards the main lobby, the receptionist silently screamed until her face went purple, flapping her arms about to attract attention. Ron, who was beginning to panic, swore and looked desperately up at the slow metal dial, which creaked languorously towards his floor.

"_Come on, come on, come on_…" Ron repeated urgently under his breath, pressing the button over and over again and sneaking quick looks behind him. He could hear a clanging and clattering that told him that the lift was making its way down.

"You! You there! Stop!"

A flash of sparks erupted by his head and Ron had to duck to avoid being hit.

Fumbling with his wand as he watched the lift finally descend onto his floor, Ron yelled, "Stupefy!" heard a groan, ducked another spell then hastily pulled open the grille. Slipping inside and yelping as a hex hit the lift right by where his hand was, Ron slammed the grille closed, pressed the 'up' button and breathed out a sigh of relief as the lift, still clanging and clattering, began to move its way up.

**-----------------------------------------**

"Bloody hell!" Harry swore loudly at the screen, a huge grin on his face as he watched Ron lean against the lift wall in relief.

"What happened! Did he make it? Is he in?" Hermione asked anxiously around her fingers, which she had placed in her mouth in terror. Her eyes were closed and she was shaking like a leaf.

Harry, turning back from the screen, beamed at her.

"Oh, he made it, all right," he said. Then looking back at Ron and wearing a strangely proud look on his face, Harry whispered, "Now, come on, mate, you can do it…"

**-----------------------------------------**

"This is ridiculous! You can't stop paying me!" Draco continued to shout. "That money's mine, fair and square!"

Lucius, ignoring the tantrum, walked calmly around Draco's seat as he carried on speaking, his son turning his head to follow him with his eyes.

"And instead of merely sitting around the house staring at yourself all day," said Lucius serenely, staring down at his son from his impressive height, "you are going to have to actually _work_ for a living, boy."

"No!" Draco cried out in disbelief, clapping his hands over his ears, falling back into his seat and feeling as though he had stepped into some horrible, horrible kind of nightmare. "No, father, please! I can't… I-I won't! You can't make me…!"

"Oh, yes I can, Draco," Lucius suddenly hissed, sounding dangerous as he leaned his face right into his son's, his arms on Draco's armrests. "You will work, and you will work _hard_ because if you don't, Draco, I _will_ disown you. Make no question of that. You will be written out of the will and be left penniless unless you start behaving like a Malfoy. Oh, and one further thing," he added as an afterthought with a bored flick of his wrist, gracefully walking around his desk and slipping into his silver-gilded seat, "you're marrying Parkinson, too."

"_No!" _Draco practically screamed in agony, making the glass in the windows tremble. Lunging across the desk to grasp his father by the arm, he found himself practically begging. "Father, please, no! I'll do anything, anything at all, just not Pansy… anyone but Pansy…! She looks like a horse! A giant sex-crazed horse that can walk on its hind legs!"

"Then you had better learn how to sidesaddle, boy," Lucius sneered, throwing off Draco's clutches easily. "Because you are in for the ride of your life. Am I making myself clear?"

Draco wanted to argue back. He wanted to wail some more. He wanted to scream continuously in a very high pitch to eventually burst Lucius's eardrums and break his father down. However, in the end, it didn't matter what he did because, right at that very moment, before Draco could throw another tantrum, threaten his father by wandpoint or even pull his best puppy-dog look, Ron Weasley blew Lucius Malfoy's office door right off its hinges.

**-----------------------------------------**

Cedric Diggory, recently appointed as the Head of Gregorian Sector VII and generally a nice-guy-all-round, was tapping at a few keys in his keyboard when the screen went fuzzy.

"Jesus!" he said irritably before sheepishly looking up at the ceiling when the clouds above him started to rumble menacingly. "Whoops, sorry, sir," he added quickly with a nervous smile before going back to frowning over the screen in front of him.

Eventually giving up the technicalities by just thumping the screen with the palm of his hand, the picture soon crackled back from static.

He then blinked.

"God damn it…" he said, his mouth dry as he took in the scene at Lucius Malfoy's office, not even noticing the thunderbolt that narrowly missed him and broke his tabletop into two.

**-----------------------------------------**

Lucius Malfoy cocked his head slightly at the rather deranged-looking redhead who was panting at his doorway, wand in hand, the remains of Lucius's door by his feet and a veil of dust all over and around him.

Lucius then raised a brow.

"I'd ask you to reimburse me for the door, but I see you're a Weasley."

"You're going to pay, Malfoy," Ron hissed, stepping over the rubble and into the office.

"Well, obviously, we've already discussed this."

"Not for the door!" Ron spat, his wand raised and shooting out sparks every time Ron's voice took a high tenor. "You're going to pay for firing my dad, for stealing my house and for nicking my girlfriend!"

"Oh, father, you didn't sleep with Granger, did you?" Draco suddenly asked, wrinkling his nose with revulsion.

"Shut it, Malfoy," Ron hissed at Draco before turning his attention back to Lucius. "You. Are. Going. To. Pay," Ron repeated, in a slower and somehow more crazed voice.

"Indeed," said Lucius, beginning to look amused as he eased out of his chair. "And pray tell, whichever number Weasley you are, how are you going to kill me and escape this building when I have twenty armed guards waiting outside, ready to gut you in an instant?"

It took a moment for Ron to realise that Malfoy had a point. Biting the inside of his cheek and thinking hard about it, it suddenly hit him. Turning to Draco, he hissed,

"Malfoy, get over here."

Draco snorted.

"I'm not going anywhere near you, Weasley, fuck off."

"_Malfoy_," Ron began to growl. He simply didn't have time for this. "Get your skinny arse over here, now."

"Or what?" Draco sneered.

"Or I'll hex you in the face."

Draco was at his side as fast as lightening. However, his compliance didn't last very long.

"Hey! Get your dirty hands off me, Weasley!" he yelped, trying to bat Ron's hands away from the scruff of his robes, not even noticing Ron had pointed a wand to his neck, as well. "Sweet Circe, is that _blood_ you're getting on my clothes?"

"Malfoy, shut up!" Ron hissed under his breath, trying to look threatening as he glared back at Lucius. "Reckon the tables have turned now, haven't they, Malfoy?"

Lucius looked mildly interested.

"Are you to bloody my son's robes until I relent?" he asked pleasantly. "Is that the plan? Because I must say, I'm in favour. Be sure to get some on the embroidery, Weasley, it's so disturbingly feminine…"

"Father!" Draco cried out in a betrayed voice.

"_Or_," Lucius carried on, continuing to sound frighteningly agreeable as he began to move forwards towards the pair, hands behind his back, strolling as though he hadn't a worry in the world, "if you put your wand down now, I'll try and make sure that your imminent death will be as quick and as painless as possible."

Ron didn't particularly like that option. And he liked it even less when he mused on it.

In fact, he was so busy musing on what Lucius Malfoy's version of a painful death might be that he didn't notice the man slowly begin to pull his wand out of his back pocket. That is until Draco poked him in the ribs and sneered, "Weasley, you idiot!" making Ron jump, throw his wand arm towards Lucius in a reflex reaction and yell,

"STUPEFY!"

A burst of light shot out from his wand, and hit Lucius squarely in the chest, making the blond man go flying over his desk, the back of his head impacting into the brickwork with a sickening crunch-like noise. Sliding down the wall like a limp puppet, leaving a trail of blood on the wall as his eyes rolled up into the back of his head, Malfoy eventually landed in a broken heap on the ground.

Ron, his wand still raised and the tip of it still glowing, was standing absolutely rooted to the spot with his mouth open in horror.

With the back of his robes still loosely clutched in Ron's hand, Draco blinked down at his father, his grey eyes wide.

"You've killed him." Draco finally managed as he turned to Ron, his face disbelieving and his eyebrows disappearing into his hair. "I would kiss you if I weren't so likely to catch something."

Malfoy then grabbed his arm before Ron, who was still very confused, recovered his senses and punched him in the face.

"Now, Weasel, I know you're incredibly dense so I'm going to say this with as few long words as possible," Malfoy said, talking very quickly. "We haven't got much time before those guards get here and fillet you so we're going to have to work fast. First things first, you are a kidnapper holding me to ransom. You killed my father, threatened me at wandpoint then you commenced in stealing my broom and whisking us both away to a secret hiding place where you will accordingly cut off one of my fingers every day your payment is evaded. You will then consequently get arrested, I'll be 'saved', receive all my father's money and the estate, not to mention the respect of all my peers from surviving such a terrible ordeal and shall then live happily ever after. Got that?"

Ron, who had been staring at Lucius Malfoy's limp body and not listening to a word Draco said, looked blankly at the Slytherin.

"Huh?" he said.

There was suddenly a sound of voices down the corridor and running footsteps approaching fast. Draco swore under his breath.

"Fucking Gryffindors," he snarled bad-temperedly, running over to the window and opening it as wide as he could before snatching at the high-tech broom that was leaning against the mantelpiece. Straddling it, he then grabbed Ron by collar of his robes, threw him on the backseat of his broom and muttered, "I know I'm going to regret this," before kicking hard off from the ground and speeding them both out the open window just as a team of armed guards burst through the broken door.


	3. Teatime During the Worst Day

-----------------------------------

**Teatime During the Worst Day**

-----------------------------------

"Cor, blimey, you don't reckon he's dead, do you?"

"I dunno… poke him with your wand…"

"Head's twisted kind of unnaturally, don't ya think…?"

"… and is he supposed to be bleeding so much…?"

The three security guards, who had been peering down at the body of Lucius Malfoy with a sort of morbid curiosity, soon turned to one another uncertainly.

"What're we supposed to do?" piped up the youngest of the group, his face rampant with acne and both his hat and uniform four sizes too big for him. Looking nervously about him, he gulped, his skin paling under his pimples. "Won't we get in trouble for not protecting him and stuff?"

The big portly guard whose nametag pronounced his name was 'Onslo', scratched at his sizeable stubbly chin thoughtfully, looking down at Lucius's glassy grey eyes.

" 'Got a point there, Winston. Fester, check his pulse."

The guard called Fester, a skinny, hunchbacked man who looked so incredibly old that he had a colony of spiders living in the cobwebs that had formed in his hair, looked down at how far he would have to push his arthritis and swore.

"Naff off, you blighter, you check it!"

"Now look 'ere, you old geezer," said Onslo heatedly, unknowingly stepping on Lucius's face as he moved around, "you ain't a Level 2 yet, so you 'ave to listen to what we say!"

"Codswallop!"

"I'm warning ya, old man, keep mentioning my mum like that and I'll…"

A sudden groan from the body by their feet suddenly halted Fester and Onslo's argument and made Winston let out a shriek and hide behind a hat-stand.

Crouching down so he could grab Lucius's limp wrist, Onslo watched as the blond man stirred out of unconsciousness.

"Merlin's bollocks," he gasped, jumping up and accidentally stepping on Lucius's face again, "the bloke's still alive! Fester, you great ancient bastard, go get some medical help, quick!"

-----------------------------------

When Draco Malfoy finally landed back on the ground again, he did so as far away from the Ministry of Magic building as he could possible get.

Technically, it was only two miles away, but he wasn't chancing his recently moisturised hands on the rough wood of his broomstick handle any longer than necessary. He was beginning to get the signs of chafing.

"I cursed your father."

Draco turned around to look at Ron. It was the first thing the redhead had said since Draco had forced him on the back of his broom and they had sped out of his father's window. Ron's eyes were distant-looking as they caught Draco's and he stood motionlessly, his complexion incredibly white under the darkening bruises and injuries on his face.

Draco had the sudden irrational urge to punch him. However, since Weasley was likely to punch him harder, not to mention the fact that he was the kind of wanker who would hit him in the face, Draco opted to glare at him instead.

"Well, there's no need to rub it in my face, Weasley," he said grumpily, snatching his broom and striding passed Ron prissily. "I would have done it first if you hadn't swanned in like a psychopath and stolen my glory. Bloody Gryffindors, everything always has to be spectacle with you, doesn't it? I mean, here I am, the one who really hated the bastard and you get to be the one to bash his skull in. Do you see the justice in that?"

At the word 'skull', Ron's head reeled and he began to go a pale green.

"We… we need to go back," he suddenly croaked, his legs trembling beneath him.

"No, we fucking don't," Draco sniffed haughtily with a toss of his hair and a smoothing down of his robes. Adjusting his collar by looking at his reflection in the muggy window beside him, Draco waved off Ron's idea like a bad smell. "I'm not getting caught in the middle of a scandal for anyone."

"But we just left him there…" Ron said faintly, looking as though he were about to fall over as he weakly rested upon a lamppost for support.

Leaning against the nearest wall and crossing his arms over his chest, Draco looked as far from concerned as could be.

"So?" he asked, wondering what Weasley's point could be. "Someone's bound to find him before he starts to smell."

Staring at him mutely, Ron's jaw went slack and he briefly wondered if Malfoy's soul had fetched a high price.

"Malfoy, your father might be _dead_," he said, gawking at the blond in disbelief and emphasising the last word just in case Draco was not aware of the fact himself. "I mean, doesn't that mean anything to you?"

Draco paused and thought about that one for a whole minute before eventually shrugging a shoulder easily and not looking very bothered.

"It means I can finally make his study a games room," he mused seriously.

Not sure how to respond to that, Ron decided it was best if he didn't.

"Where are we?" he asked weakly, closing his eyes and leaning his flushed face against the cool steel of the lamppost.

"Knockturn Alley," Draco replied in a bored tone, looking down at his nails.

"Oh. Ok," Ron said with a nod. He then thought about it. "Wait, _what!_" he yelped.

"Weasley, keep your fucking voice down," Draco sneered, looking shiftily about before pulling Ron roughly aside so they were hidden in the shadows of a shop alcove. "Do you think I want people to see me in your company?"

"Oh, piss off, ferret," Ron spat as he snapped himself out of his daze, pushing Draco off him. "You think it's all roses for me being seen with you?"

"Of course it's not, Weasley," Draco said nastily, his tone spiteful as he wiped down his robes where Ron had shoved him. "Standing next to me makes you look like nothing in comparison."

"Keeping talking, Malfoy, and you won't be standing very long," Ron growled, grabbing Draco by his recently fixed collar and lifting a fist threateningly.

"How quaint," Draco said, looking at the fist that was hovering over his face with a droll, amused little look on his face. "For fuck's sake, Weasley, put that away before you hurt yourself."

"The plan is to hurt you, you little pillock!"

Feigning sadness, Draco jutted his lip overdramatically.

"And here I am, saving you from being arrested for murder, Weasley," he drawled, the grief in his sentence so fake that Draco couldn't help but smile throughout it. He then sniffed. "What an ungrateful wretch you are."

Ron stared at him blankly.

"… huh?" he said, his fist still hovering mid-air.

Draco rolled his eyes, wondering if all Gryffindors were this dense.

"Merlin, it's a wonder you even learnt how to read…"

"_Malfoy…"_ Ron began menacingly, tightening his hold on Draco's collar.

"Weasley, you've _killed_ the Minister of Magic," Draco suddenly snapped in abrupt exasperation. "What do you think they're going to do to you, give you a fine and a finger-wag of disapproval? Tsk at you and tell you not to do it again?"

Ron looked stumped at this.

"I… I didn't really think about it…" he stuttered, looking almost comical as he blinked repeatedly.

"Well, you'll have plenty of time to think about it in Azkaban," Draco retorted, slapping Ron's hand away from his robes with a scowl. "About sixty years, I'd wager."

Ron was beginning to go green again.

"Oh God, I don't feel well…"

Grinning maliciously, Draco's slight smirk became a full-on beam.

"If you're going to throw up, Weasel, I'd do it near that shop over there. They sell Muggle clothes, after all..."

However, Ron didn't stay to listen to the rest of the sentence. Clapping his hand over his mouth, he belted across to where Draco was pointing, bent over almost ninety degrees then expelled the contents of his stomach all over the wall.

Watching him for a few seconds with an evilly triumphant look on his face, Draco soon turned away to take in his surroundings.

"Now," he said happily, looking about him with lively curiously as Ron continued to retch loudly in the corner. "Where's Flint's place again?"

----------------------------------------

"What's their status?" Hermione asked briskly, slipping her coat on as she and Harry burst their way into the brilliant whiteness that was the Gregorian Sector's busy main office. Both looking anxious, they practically smacked each other out of the way with the suitcases in their hands to get into the room first.

Hermione, who won easily by shoving Harry right into the open door with her handbag, quickly made her way towards the Head of the Department, pulling her wheeled suitcase along behind her.

Cedric Diggory, who was sitting at his luminous white workstation and tapping a few keys on his flat white keyboard with a trained efficiency, looked up at their arrival and waved them over. He looked positively giddy with a white quill tucked behind his ear and a strange spring in his step (although he was technically sitting down) as he pressed his ENTER button with a flourish. He then peered into his screen.

"Well, they're both still alive, if that's any help," he said cheerfully.

"You mean they haven't killed each other yet?" Harry asked incredulously, unpeeling himself from the door before slipping into the vacant seat beside Cedric and dumping his bag by his feet. His face was so lined with stress that even his scar looked wrinkled.

Looking across at him, Cedric raised his eyebrows.

"You alright there, Harry?" he asked, eying Harry's dishevelled appearance and psychotic hair with a strange type of fascination.

"I hate my life and I want to die," said Harry in a monotone.

"Bit late for that, isn't it?" Cedric asked good-naturedly, his eyes crinkling at the corners as he patted Harry genially on the back.

"What's their location?" Hermione cut in, looking briefly over at Harry in annoyance before peering nervously at Cedric's blinding white computer screen. "We've got to intercept them before they go off completely on their own. Can you find us the neighbourhood?"

Cedric's fingers flew over a couple more keys, his keen grey eyes fixed to the text appearing on his monitor.

"Knockturn Alley," he eventually said.

"_Knockturn Alley_?" Harry and Hermione said in unison, looking at one another in bewilderment.

"Yup, Knockturn Alley," Cedric confirmed with a nod as he spun around on his swivel chair to face them, looking content and relaxed as he stretched and placed his hands indolently behind his head.

Pursing her lips briefly at this blatant display of laziness, Hermione leaned so close to the screen that her nose itched from the static it was emanating.

"Cedric, can you pinpoint where they're heading exactly?"

"Sure, give me a few seconds…" Cedric said with a few more hurried clicks of his keyboard. Then, with a few more than that, "Right… let me just type in the access code and… Ok, there! APB permission granted and co-ordinates acquired."

As soon as Cedric said this, a small map suddenly popped up on the screen, quite similar to the Marauders Map in appearance and system. Two dots were currently flashing on-screen before their eyes, one labelled 'Draco Malfoy', the other 'Ron Weasley' and both were emitting small little beep noises, as though swearing furiously at one another.

"Ok, definitely found them. They're keeping away from the bigger roads and staying on the alleyways. Seems like they're taking a shortcut to Upper Knockturn Alley from Boils Lane and that they're heading for… _whoa_…" Cedric stopped mid-sentence, coherent speech escaping him. Looking up from his computer, his eyes were as wide and round as galleons. "Bloody hell, they're heading for _The Serpent's Lair_."

"_The Serpent's _what?" asked Hermione, clueless, just as Harry cried out,

"The strip club?"

Smiling sheepishly at the sour look Hermione was giving him, Harry awkwardly scratched at the back of his head, even as Hermione eventually turned back to Cedric.

"Do you know how long they'll be staying there?" she asked, still throwing the occasional look of disapproval at Harry.

"Looks like they'll be in there a while," Cedric said, checking the log on his computer and tapping his monitor with his index finger. "At least twenty minutes. That should give you guys plenty of time to get there. And it's a good place to start tailing them. From what I - and I'm sure Harry – can remember…" Harry winced "the _Lair_ is dark and busy; they shouldn't notice you if you're careful. I'll call Gertrude in Transportation if you'd like, tell her you're coming through so she can ready the lift back to earth…?"

"Thanks, Cedric," Hermione said gratefully, picking up her bags and placing them on her shoulders. Then turning to Harry, who was still looking sheepishly uncomfortable, Hermione rolled her eyes and sighed. "Oh, for heaven sake's, Harry, just come on. We've got a lift to catch."

Letting out a sigh of relief and throwing Cedric a weak grin, Harry shook off his embarrassment and followed after Hermione. However, it was just when he had stepped his way through the doorway out of the room that Hermione turned around to face him with a disturbingly sweet smile on her face.

"But once we're in the lift, Harry, you can tell me all about how exactly you know about _Lair_, can't you?"

------------------------------

"Close your mouth, Weasley. Haven't you ever seen a naked woman before?"

Ron, who was so red-faced that he looked like he had a chronic skin disease, could barely open his mouth.

"Shut your face, Malfoy," he mumbled out of the corner of his mouth, his cheeks burning like fire as the pretty, barely-dressed young witch with a python wrapped around her wiggled her hips seductively towards him.

Smirking at the stunned and rather stupid look on Ron's face, Draco turned amusedly back to the man who was sitting across from him, eyeing him curiously as he sipped upon his gobletful of smoking green cocktail.

Dressed in a crisp, snakeskin pair of robes, Marcus Flint was still as trollish looking as ever although he did appear to have acquired a touch more class since his Hogwarts days. However, since Marcus was a little more than a common brute in school, being a 'touch' more respectable made him the seediest businessman in all of Knockturn Alley. The lowest of the low and the most depraved person in all the land.

He was doing diabolically well.

Putting down his drink, Draco tried to look as amiable and friendly as he possibly could. It hurt his cheeks so much it almost brought a tear to his eye.

"I see the place is looking the same as always, Marcus," Draco commented, his eye involuntarily twitching with all the effort smiling put upon his face.

He wasn't lying, though. _The Serpent's Lair_ _did _look the same.

The underground dungeon was still dark and purposely dank-looking and still illuminated with that same soft green light that made the walls look like they were moulding. Spiked shackles and other eye-catching, twisted metal devices even now hung to the walls like torturous works of art in a gallery and the music had not changed from a strange mix of screams and a type of Muggle rock that made Draco flinch with revulsion. Strobe lights and magical sparks continued to flash and flicker around the darkened dungeon and scantily clad (if that) witches were still dancing around drooling wizards on poles, podiums and in their laps whilst stealing galleons from their pockets without them even noticing.

Draco thought it all so cheap and depraved that he felt he was never going to get the stink out of his hair.

Eyeing Draco's ill-disguised disgust, Marcus made a facial expression.

You couldn't quite call what he did then as a smile since it appeared to involve far too many teeth to be described as such, but he did look fiercely amused.

"Cut the pompous crap, Malfoy, you've always hated this place."

Draco sniffed haughtily.

"I don't know what you… Keep jiggling your dirty crotch in my face and you'll lose it," he suddenly snapped at the girl who had been trying to attract his attention for the last five minutes.

As the witch went pink and stormed away in her heels (which consequently, were the only things she was wearing), Marcus made that expression again, only his mouth stretched wider this time. It was horribly unpleasant to witness.

"Malfoy, if you don't want people to know you're a fag, you should stop acting like one."

"If you don't want people to know you're ugly, Flint, you should get surgery," Draco spat back. "And for the last fucking time, I'm not a shirtlifter."

Flint showed his teeth some more. Draco paled and moved backwards. He wasn't sure if Flint was amused or if he was about to rip his throat out.

"What do you call him then?" Marcus asked, motioning to Ron behind them.

"Weasley?" Draco asked, turning to eye the redhead, who was still battered and bruised and currently bright red as the witch who had been dancing about him placed her python around his neck and began to wiggle into his lap. Finding the idea so laughable that he grinned throughout, Draco turned back to Flint. "I'd rather shove a flobberworm up my arse."

"Oh, I'm sure you would," Flint said, leering at Weasley in a way that made Draco irrationally want to smack him in the face.

"Look, I haven't got time for this, Flint. I need you to do something for me."

Marcus Flint frowned at that, lowering his own glass of mead in suspicion.

"What makes you think I'd do you a favour, Malfoy?" he asked, eyes narrowed in distrust.

Draco simply smiled at that, twirling the straw in his glass so the smoke emanating from his drink curled in sinister waves around his hands.

"You owe me, Marcus."

"I owe your father."

"You hate my father."

"I hate you, too."

"Yes, but you hate me slightly less."

Marcus pursed his lips, which in itself was incredible with those teeth of his.

"I'm listening, Malfoy," he said slowly.

Draco smiled. Flint was so predictable sometimes.

"I need you to tell the Ministry you saw me and Weasley here," he drawled, as though explaining the idea to a backwards child. Draco was very good at using that tone; he grew up with Crabbe and Goyle after all. "You also need to mention that you saw him pointing a wand at me, you saw me with my hands bound and you saw us heading out of Knockturn Alley."

Marcus raised his considerable eyebrows at that.

"And why would Weasley be pointing his wand at you?" he inquired, sounding mildly interested.

"He's kidnapping me," Draco explained shortly, waving a hand in a distracted manner.

"Right. I can see that," said Marcus as he watched Ron unsuccessfully trying to fight off another witch, who was now ruffling his bright red hair. Turning back to Draco, Marcus Flint frowned. "You're asking a lot, Malfoy."

"Flint," Draco said in a tired voice, rolling his eyes, "if it wasn't for me, you'd have named this place 'The Dirty Dungeon'."

Flint thought about that for a second.

"… Ok, I'll do it, but I don't see what you're trying to prove by doing all this, Malfoy," he said, still not looking very convinced. "I mean, this isn't about to make anyone forget that thing with that male prostitute at your last birthday par-…"

"That never fucking happened, Flint," Draco suddenly spat out savagely as he grasped the edge of the table until his knuckles went white, his face pink and his eyes more than slightly hysterical looking. "_Never_."

Marcus just snorted at that.

"Just because your father tried to sweep it under the carpet, Draco, doesn't mean we don't all know about it. People still talk about it at functions when you're not there. Hell, they talk about it when you _are_ there, they just lower their voices. What makes you think this little stunt's going to do anything? When you get back, you're still going to have to marry Parkinson and, knowing your father, no attention-seeking plan is going to change that."

Listening to Marcus's words, one would have thought that Draco would have either hexed the boy or started to cry at the truth in his words. However, Draco didn't do either of these things. Instead, he smiled so fiercely at Marcus Flint that even his eyebrows looked evil.

"Don't you worry your ah, _pretty_ little head about me, Marcus," Draco said with a smirk, his smile widening even more at the bad-tempered look Marcus threw at him. "Let's just say Daddy dearest won't have much to say about me and… well, _anything_, ever again."

Looking doubtful, Marcus nevertheless shrugged.

"Whatever, Malfoy. I'll send your father's office an owl when you leave."

Nodding with satisfaction, Draco regally lifted his glass to his lips and drained it in as neat a fashion as one could.

"Good," he said when he had finished, placing the empty glass back on the table, the smoke still floating from it. "Now," said Draco, folding his arms, leaning forward and lowering his voice as though what he was next about to say was of the utmost importance, "where are your toilets again?"

----------------------------

"… am I standing in a urinal?"

Looking down at Harry's feet, Hermione blinked curiously at the porcelain bowl beneath them and, deciding to momentarily use her massive brain – as she had done many a time to get the trio out of some sort of scrape - she safely concluded the obvious.

"Yes, Harry," she confirmed with a nod of her head. "You are."

Turning to eye the ceiling, Hermione watched as the gaudy gold lift that had just expelled them from its innards disappeared back up through the ceiling like a hologram and, presumably, back into the sky and the _Gate_. Hermione then began to brush off the dust from her robes – travelling by the _Heavenly Gate_'s elevator during these inter-planetary journeys always seemed to get an extraordinarily irritating amount of glitter on her clothes.

"Oh," said Harry, his own glitter shining in his hair like golden pieces of dandruff. Then hesitantly opening his mouth again, "Hermione?"

"Yes, Harry?" said Hermione, turning to the mirror as calmly as she could so she could take in her reflection. She looked remarkably pale and her eyes were bright.

"_Why_ am I standing in a urinal?"

Momentarily savouring the imperfect smell of the place and the downright filthy words that were scrawled on the stall door just to the left of her, Hermione tried not to feel too homesick. She never realised she could miss the scent of urine and the vulgar reek of deficiency so much.

"Because the administration is incompetent," she tried to explain as she ignored the pull at her heart and lifted up her chin in an attempt to look prissy. She always managed to pull it off, without fail. "Why else would my suitcase have landed in the sink?"

Turning his head to eye where Hermione was airily gesturing towards, Harry briefly noted the corner of the luggage, which was sitting rather out-of-place and bulky in the basin.

He raised his brows.

"Wow, their aim is rubbish," he said. He then paused to incline his head, listening to the pounding music that was playing on the other side of the lavatory door. "… we're really back, aren't we?"

Hermione stiffened slightly.

"It would appear so," she said, not catching his eye as she attempted to lower her suitcase down to the ground.

Harry's eyes scanned around the room, taking in the stains, the cracked mirror and even the graffiti Hermione had herself spied earlier. He then let out the biggest smile.

"We're actually back," he said, the green's of his eyes glowing and his voice almost giddy with excitement. "I mean… we're home."

"Don't speak too soon," Hermione said, trying not to sound too acidic in tone. "We've still got a job to do, Harry."

Harry blinked at her.

"What's wrong with you?" he asked flummoxed as his eyes looked huge behind his glasses.

"Nothing," Hermione said tartly. Still tugging on her suitcase, which appeared to have got itself stuck between the tap and rim of the sink, she finally gave up after a few minutes and sighed in resignation. Glancing up at the mirror, she looked at Harry's reflection and gave him a small, weary little smile. "It's just that… I… I don't want to get my hopes up, Harry."

Not knowing what to say to that, Harry opened his mouth and thought for a minute about what would be appropriately reassuring yet manly enough so he didn't look like a pansy. However, before he could find the ideal sentence he was saved from replying by the sound of footsteps outside.

"Harry, someone's coming!" Hermione whispered urgently. Leaving her suitcase, she dashed into the nearest stall and hissed, "Quick, get in here!"

Finally jumping out of the urinal and wincing at what he found at the bottom of his shoes, Harry quickly slipped himself inside the stall beside her, sliding along the floor on his way. Grasping the side of the door as soon as he got inside, Hermione had just about pulled it shut when the lavatory's main door slid open and Draco Malfoy stepped himself inside.

Blond head luminous under the glaring lights of the bathroom and his clothes even more expensive-looking in comparison to the scene he was standing in, Malfoy briefly looked about in an imperious manner. He then wrinkled his nose in repugnance.

"Good God," he muttered under his breath in disgust.

However, what he was next about to do would forever remain a mystery. If he had planned to sneer and walk out, complain some more or even unzip, no one would ever know, not even Draco himself because in one fell swoop, Draco was smacked on the back of the head and fell in a crumpled heap on the ground.

Letting out a gasp that would have been loud enough to alert someone's attention if Harry hadn't rather sensibly clasped his hand over her mouth, Hermione almost let out another gasp when she spied who exactly it was who was standing over Malfoy's limp body with a bottle in his hand.

"Muumph!" said Hermione against Harry's hand.

And it was a "Muumph!" sort of situation indeed. Because not only had Ron Weasley 'killed' the Minister of Magic but he had now knocked out his only son and was leaving the restroom with the unconscious blond flung over his shoulder.

"Um, Hermione," said Harry, scratching his free hand and looking confused as they both watched Ron leave the lavatory, "is Ron supposed to be doing that?"

Turning to each other briefly, they quickly bolted to the door Ron had just exited by and yanked it open. Sure enough, Ron was still holding Malfoy like a limp puppet through the crowds.

Continuing to watch in awe, Harry and Hermione maintained their stares as Marcus Flint, who was drinking his mead in his corner, briefly ceased this important task as Ron walked passed him to the exit of the _Lair._ Catching sight of Draco, hanging helplessly off the redhead, Marcus then simply snorted at the blond.

"Drama queen," he said, rolling his eyes as they left and not even noticing the two luggage-carrying figures that hurried after them out the door.


	4. The End of the Worst Day

-----------------------------------------

**The End of the Worst Day**

-----------------------------------------

Ron Weasley was not a rational person. To be fair, he never really had been.

There were the occasional times when he did something that was rather sensible but most of the time he didn't really like it (or Hermione was poking him in the ribs and whispering furiously in his ear what to do).

So when he decided to knock out Draco Malfoy and kidnap him for real, all on his own, Ron reckoned it wasn't a good idea from the start.

Not that he cared that much, mind you. Just that image of Malfoy lying at his feet, his mouth open, his eyes rolled back and a line of drool trailing down from his bottom lip to his chin were good enough for any repercussions kidnapping him might have.

As Ron thought back on it, shifting the body that was hanging limply over his shoulder and wincing as he wondered how a skinny little rake like Malfoy could weigh this much, he was still not entirely sure what he was doing or what it was in the first place that had set him off.

It might have been the group of Ministry Aurors who had stepped into the _Lair_ and proceeded to just stare at him. It might have been the fact that even the witches who were dancing at their poles and podiums were turning to look at him curiously amidst their moves. Or it might have been the old newspaperman outside who was bellowing, "Minister attacked! Culprit identified…!"

Whatever it was, it made Ron break out into a cold sweat and panic enough to make him push the girls grinding into him with little finesse and jump to his feet clumsily.

"Malfoy, where's Malfoy?" he had asked Flint breathlessly as he spotted the other man, who was sipping at his drink in his booth and occasionally craning his head to look interestedly at the dancer nearest to him. Eventually turning to Ron and raising a brow at him like a jungle cat sizing up their lunch, Flint slowly grinned. Ron flinched at the assault on his eyes.

"Bathroom break," Flint had said easily with a leer so discomfiting that it made Ron want to cover his privates. "I was just wondering when you'd 'conveniently' join him."

Not having time to fathom what Flint meant by that (although the look he was giving Ron's bottom gave him a pretty good indication), he gave him a quick, "Thanks", picked up an empty Butterbeer bottle from a recently vacated table and proceeded to open the bathroom door.

And rest, as it were, was history.

"Nugrrrr," Malfoy groaned from over his shoulder, still half-unconscious.

Ignoring him, Ron bit his lip and looked from side to side in a rather shifty manner.

He then reached an arm over his shoulder, groped about until his hand closed around the broom strapped to his back and had just managed to pull it out before him when he thought he heard a noise.

Spinning around so fast in panic that Malfoy's limp head collided with a lamppost, Ron scrambled clumsily for his wand, almost dropping it as he cast _Lumos!_ and pointed the light shakily up the narrow cobbled alleyway he had just come from.

Scanning the lane frenetically for a few minutes and eventually seeing nothing but a stray cat hobbling its way into a crack in a fence, Ron hesitantly lowered his wand although his blue eyes were still frantic and mad-looking.

Turning around, even more panicked than he was before, he unceremoniously plonked Malfoy onto the broom with more haste than flair so the blond's cheek was resting on the broom handle and his arms were hanging off the sides. Then giving the alleyway one last wary look and glancing nervously up at the sky as though seeking out help from God Himself, Ron kicked them both off the ground and into the air.

* * *

"This is not good, this is not good…" Hermione was whimpering over and over again in a repetitive sort of mantra, looking distressed as she and Harry hurried after Ron. 

Making sure to keep the bright red hair in their sights but lag far enough away not to be seen by him, the pair scrambled after Ron with their bags still hanging awkwardly off of them, their faces red and their voices breathless with the exertion.

Ducking into the shadows of a rather shady looking shop's doorway, Harry craned his neck to peer after his retreating friend, his eyes wide and disbelieving. He then turned to Hermione, shaking his head in awe.

"He's gone completely mental," he said faintly.

"Mental!" Hermione hissed, looking slightly mental herself as she tried to get a hand through her hair in agitation and merely resulted in getting it stuck in a series of knots instead. "Harry, I don't think you understand the severity of the situation! This was not supposed to happen! This wasn't in the script! He's going against Fate itself! Don't you see?"

Harry really didn't.

He was going to shrug and ask what the big deal was but Hermione was grasping onto his arm so incredibly tightly that he felt a throwaway comment like that one would result in a broken arm. So he tried to go for something more placating.

"So… that's bad?" he hazarded.

"Bad!" Hermione yelped louder than she planned.

Ron, who was still walking ahead of them, stopped in his tracks at the word and spun around.

Slapping his hand over Hermione's mouth before she could say anything else, Harry pulled her roughly into the shadows of the shop front beside him and kept still. Holding his breath and sucking his stomach in as much as he physically could, he watched Ron from the corner of his eye, pointing his wand in their direction, the wandlight just brushing against Harry's profile.

Hermione was muffling indignantly against Harry's palm, but being such a clever witch, had the sense to do so in a quiet voice.

In fact, she did it so quietly that it gave plenty of opportunity for Harry to ignore her and incline his head subtly to hazard the first proper look he had had at Ron's face in two months.

Harry then wrinkled his nose.

His best friend looked like shit.

"Mummphmum!" said Hermione crossly from his right. Shaking out of his stupor and realising that Ron had now given up the search to turn around and lower Malfoy onto his broom, Harry reluctantly moved to uncover Hermione's mouth.

Glaring at him but deciding to drop it (for now at least), Hermione raised her chin with dignity. However, this only lasted a second or two because Ron soon kicked himself and Malfoy into the air and shortly became just a dark speck in the darkening sky.

Harry and Hermione's faces fell.

"Lost him, have you?" a smooth, patronising voice said from beside them.

Letting out a huge groan as he recognised the voice, Harry squeezed shut his eyes in severe disappointment at the figure that had suddenly appeared, standing so comfortably between Harry and Hermione it was almost as though he had always been there.

Once again, Hermione mentally cursed demons and their dramatic entrances.

"What are you doing here, Zabini?" she demanded, annoyed at both his timing and his proximity, especially since her most deadly look looked somewhat demented from this angle.

Dressed in a sharp, exquisitely cut blood-red pair of robes and idly playing with the silver trident broach that was glimmering on the chest of it, Blaise Zabini continued to look up at the sky as he replied, his long slanting eyes scanning the exact location where Draco and Ron had disappeared.

"Keeping an eye on a dear friend, Granger, same as you," he said, briefly turning his head to give her a contemptuous smirk.

Putting her hands on her hips, Hermione tried to look as threatening as she could. To her even greater annoyance, Zabini, who was emitting the same fiery red glow all demons did, looked even more amused.

"This isn't your jurisdiction, Zabini," she said tersely, hoping to deter him with her best Head Girl voice. "You have no business being here. When I tell your supervisor of your blatant disregard of the rules…"

"Can it, Granger," Zabini said with a dry smile, his high cheekbones prominent even in the dim light. "I have as much right to be here as you." Then, with a lazy flick of his hand and a flash of red, a piece of parchment appeared right out of smoke and in front of Hermione's face. Zabini was looking incredibly smug. "Malfoy is one of ours."

"Oh please, everyone knows that anyway," Hermione scoffed, batting the paper away rudely with the back of her hand and looking irritable. "He was practically born with horns."

"You don't know the half of it, Granger," said Zabini, smiling thinly so a sliver of his canines were seen. "Read the birth certificate."

For that's what the paper was, Harry had realised as he craned his neck to run his eyes over the parchment. It was a tatty, burnt-around-the-edges scrap of parchment with Draco Malfoy's name at the top and a small, rather clawed-looking footprint on the bottom right corner.

Thinking the footprint was irregular at first, Harry soon found it was perfectly normal compared to the rest of the information on the certificate.

Lifting up his head to look back at Zabini, he let out a grin.

"You can't be serious," he said, trying his hardest not to start laughing in the demon's face – that was never a good idea. "Malfoy? Born a demon? I mean, it explains a lot but… this is a joke, right?"

"No joke, Potter," said Zabini, brushing dirt off his shoulder with a haughty expression. "Now, if you'll excuse me, changing fate takes a tiresome amount of effort and I simply haven't the time to stand here yammering away with …"

"It was you!" Hermione suddenly gasped, pointing a shaky finger in his face as she cut through Zabini's words. "You're the one who is changing everything! What did you do? Plant paranoia in Ron's head? Coerce him into losing his mind and kidnapping Malfoy? Do you know how much trouble you're going to be in! They were supposed to come to a civil agreement, gather a gaining respect for one another and fall madly in love and now you've ruined it…!"

Blaise didn't look too fazed by this as he yawned.

"My orders come from the top, Granger," he said with a bored little shrug. "Lucifer wants this Malfoy/Weasley situation to be resolved his way and he wants me to do it. It's funny really, you'd think someone so evil and wrong would be all for sodomy but he's pulling out all the stops to ensure those two don't get together as intended. He likes to think his demons can do better."

"Malfoy would be lucky to even get Ron," Harry suddenly piped up defensively before he could stop himself, scowling. "And you can tell Lucifer that we were here before him so we get first dibs on what happens. Oh, and He better not be planning to do something bad to Ron or he'll have us to deal with. Besides, shouldn't he know better than to try and change destiny? Ron and Malfoy getting together is like… for the greater good of everyone, isn't it…?"

"Oh, come of it, Potter," Zabini said with a smirk, his eyes glowing from the fiery light around him. "You want Weasley and Draco to get together as much as Lucifer does. Maybe if you switched sides and worked with us…"

"Never going to happen, Zabini," said Harry immediately, his green eyes narrowed.

Zabini shrugged, not very bothered.

"Have it your way, Potter. But when you're forced to watch them rutting like a pair of filthy animals and are trying to gauge out your own eyes whilst screaming to Heaven, 'Why?', just remember Hell offered you a way out. As it is…" and here Zabini straightened his robes and readjusted his broach once again, "let the best plane win."

And with that last sentence and an almost patronising lift of his hand to say farewell, he disappeared as quickly and quietly as he had arrived.

Glaring furiously at the empty spot between them and realising just how much she loathed demons, Hermione grabbed Harry by the arm and looked anxiously at him.

"Come on, Harry, we need to send a message to Gabriel and find Ron as quick as we can. This mission just got a lot more complicated…"

* * *

Irvin Fletcher, assistant to the Minister of Magic and general yes-man, was bored. 

He had doodled little drawings of bunnies all over the margins of his reports, had twiddled his thumbs to a point of distraction and had even tried to partake in a conversation with himself but to no avail. He was still bored.

But then again, sitting in St Mungo's hospital with a patient was hardly very fun. Especially when the patient was still unconscious.

Not that Irvin minded; he rather preferred Lucius Malfoy unconscious. He was a lot nicer this way and, consequently, had been his nice new self for the last six hours.

That was a quarter of a whole day of not being unpleasant, which was a record in itself for the Minister.  
Yes, at that moment in time, the assistant could safely say that he had never liked the man more than he did right then. With his cold eyes closed, his pale skin clammy and his contemptuous mouth forming little spit bubbles at the corners, Irvin thought Lucius had never been more charming.

Of course, then he had to go and wake up.

"Weasley."

Letting out a yelp at the voice, the assistant jumped, his forms cascading down into a papery puddle by his feet, which he soon jumped to.

"Minister!" he cried out, rushing to the side of the hospital bed breathlessly. "You're awake!"

Lucius, hair limp and greasy and fanned all over his pillow, cracked open a puffy eye and absently licked at his dry lips, finding it difficult to speak. However he had no trouble in rasping "Weasley" once again.

Irvin felt rather offended.

"No, Minister, it's Fletcher…"

"I know your name, you fool!" Lucius suddenly snapped irritably, levering himself up by his elbows so he could sit up, sounding a lot more like his old self. "Where's Weasley?"

"I- Arthur Weasley, sir?"

"No, you incompetent idiot, his son!"

Irvin blinked. He had never seen the Minister this wound up before. At least when Lucius insulted him in the past he'd be slightly more subtle about it.

"But… er, Minister," Irvin began tentatively, deciding to move backwards slowly in preservation of his life, "Arthur Weasley has… well, quite a number of sons… perhaps if you were more specific…?"

"The one who will soon be dead!" Lucius barked, looking insane.

With the unexpected bravery of a Gryffindor (which was strange because he would have been sorted straight into Hufflepuff had he even gone to Hogwarts), Irvin tried again.

"… Sir, that isn't helping me much…"

The vein that was throbbing in Lucius's forehead looked like it was about to explode.

"The one who Draco went to school with… the one who worked at the Ministry… Potter's friend… Weasley!" he practically roared, slamming his hands down on the tray on his bed so hard that it cracked down the middle.  
Irvin, who felt it would be rude to wipe the spittle from his glasses, was just about to do so anyway when a flashback of the morning suddenly hit him like a ton of pewter cauldrons. It also, consequently, made him recall the last person who had yelled at him like this.

"… Ronald, sir?" he said hesitantly. "Ron Weasley?"

The dangerous look that crossed over Lucius's face at that moment was so devastatingly horrible that it made every hair on Irvin's body stand on end, as though they were trying to get as far away as possible.

"_Ron,"_ hissed Lucius with pure venom, his eyes slit and his thin mouth curled in an almost inhuman fashion. "I should have guessed; it's a cheap name."

Irvin, whose favourite wireless country singer at the moment was called Ron, wisely decided to keep quiet at that. He also decided to keep quiet about everything else Lucius began to hiss out malevolently under his breath, most of which involved Ron Weasley in situations of agonising torture, excruciating pain and ultimate death.

Irvin, who had heard all these things many times before since Lucius pretty much used the same speech on everyone he disliked, zoned out for a bit and was pondering on what he would make himself for dinner when Lucius suddenly stopped to look at him.

"Fletcher," Lucius said as though he had only just realised something.

Irvin, who had been dreaming of baked potatoes, shook himself out of it.

"Yes, sir?"

"Where in Hades's hell is my son?"

* * *

When Draco Malfoy slowly stirred awake, he automatically noticed three things in succession.

His head was killing him, the décor of the room he was in was terrible and he was tied to a chair.

He shifted a bit to make sure.

Yes, he was definitely tied to a chair. Which, in itself, was a peculiar event.

Frowning slightly, Draco pondered, like he had the other eight times he had woken up tied to a piece of furniture, on how this could have happened. He knew one thing for sure, unlike three of those times, he hadn't done this willingly. The appalling decoration of the room he was in was all the proof he needed to know that – after all, he would rather die than ever inflict himself to this sort of surrounding.

And was that hay under his feet…?

Summing up the pros and cons of the situation, Draco sat back as far as he could in his binds and tried to think rationally about what was best to do next.

Then remembering he was a Slytherin and that he didn't need to be rational about anything, he thought, 'screw that', opened his mouth and started to continuously scream at the top of his lungs instead.

It took a few seconds for a stomping of heavy footfalls to be heard but when they were, the sopping wet and furious body of Ron Weasley eventually burst through the door with them, his lower half swathed only in a towel and his hands clamped over his ears.

Then, opening his mouth, Ron went for the most eloquent thing he could think of at that moment.

"Malfoy, shut up!"

Draco, who had stopped screaming as soon as he took in Ron's appearance, looked utterly appalled by the reception. Then it hit him.

"You've kidnapped me!" he accused.

Ron, who had finally lowered his hands from his ears since they were no longer in danger, shrugged at that casually.

"That was the plan, wasn't it?" he asked nonchalantly.

"Not literally!" Draco yelped, trying to jump to his feet. Forgetting that he was magically bound to a chair, he fell back down again, the spindly stool almost toppling over with his efforts. Somehow regaining his balance, Draco let out a curse so vile that it made Ron's eyebrows jump to his wet hairline. And the blond didn't stop there. "This wasn't part of the plan, you ginger bastard, let me go!" he shrieked, thrashing and thumping against his binds so violently that Ron made sure to stay back. "Are you listening, Weasley? If you don't let me out of this chair right now there will be hell to pay! Do you hear me? HELL!"

Ron – who heard every word clearly since they were being screeched at him from only three feet away – stood solidly where he was, not budging.

"Nothing doing, Malfoy," he said stubbornly, although he did duck hastily when Draco tried to lunge forward and bite him. "Oi, watch it! Now, look here, ferret, you're going to sit still or I'm going to make you! Is that clear?"

Draco, who was still trying to, quite literally, get his teeth into Ron, let out a scoff so heavy with disdain that he almost choked on it.

"Oh please, I know your game…!" he snarled, his eyes narrowed as he tried to look as threatening as a skinny, effeminate bound man possible could, pushing his chair forwards towards Ron so it left a trail in the dusty floor. "Tying me up with sexual intent? Swanning in here all naked and planning to have your wicked way with me…? You are _so_ transparent! Well, don't you even dare try, Weasley! I swear, if you even touch one fabulous hair on my head with your perverse little fingers then I'll do something so horribly unpleasant, so incredibly nasty, so disgustingly horrid that…!"

"Oh, shut your gob, Malfoy," Ron said, rolling his eyes. He was already getting a headache. "Rape you? Please, no one in the world will ever be _that_ desperate."

Draco looked as though his eyes were about to pop out of his head.

"Desperate!" he screeched in such an impossibly high voice that it made Ron groan and cover his ears again. "I'll have you know that _Witch Weekly_ voted me 'Most Eligible…'! "

"I don't care if they voted you 'Most Likely to be a Woman', Malfoy...!" Ron retorted snappily, lowering his arms to cross them petulantly over his chest instead. "Just shut that bloody trap of yours or _else."_

"Or else what, Weasel?" Draco sneered nastily, trying his hardest to prove that looks could kill as he gave Ron the best he had. "Going to get really tough and tie me to the table instead? Oh, you wait until I come up with a diabolical escape, hex you when your back is turned and get out of here. What little name you had will be finished, Weasley. Not only will I tell them you killed my father, but that you tried to torture me cruelly with whips and chains and…"

"Your father's not dead, Malfoy."

"Shut up, Weasley, can't you see I'm concocting?" Draco then stopped to think about what Ron just said. "And what do you mean my father's not dead?"

"What do you think I mean, you little pillock?" Ron snapped. "He's alive and at St Mungo's and is swearing bloody revenge on me, that's what. Here, read it yourself if you don't believe me."

Picking up the newspaper that was lying on the nearest table and practically throwing it at Malfoy, Ron then slumped himself into the chair opposite Draco's.

The newspaper, which luckily enough landed on Draco's lap with the front page facing him, was adorned with the huge words, _Minister Attacker 'Will Be Punished'_ and two moving pictures, one of Lucius Malfoy sitting in a hospital bed, his eye twitching and his teeth bared in fury and the other of Ron during his Seventh Year, looking very confused.

Scanning briefly over the article, Draco's eyes widened when he saw a reference to himself.

… _As for the mysterious disappearance of Draco Malfoy, whom sources have confirmed was present during his father's appalling attack, an eyewitness account has finally shed light on the matter. Mr Marcus Flint, an honest business proprietor situated just off Diagon Alley, has verified that the Minister's only son has been kidnapped by none other than his father's assailant. "Well, Weasley had him slung over his shoulder unconscious and was walking about with him down the streets of Knockturn Alley for all to see, so it's not like it was a big secret or anything…" says Flint, shrugging…_

Continuing to read passed his own mention and finishing the rest of the article with his mouth slightly open, Draco eventually looked up at Ron. He then grinned.

"You are so screwed, Weasley," he said gleefully.

"Shut up, Malfoy," Ron growled.

But Malfoy didn't shut up. He just looked even more elated.

"Do you have any idea how much trouble you're in?" he continued, his happiness shining through as his face split into the biggest grin that Ron had ever seen on his face. "Merlin, Lucius is going to kill you!"

Just hearing the world 'kill' made Ron start to feel slightly nauseous again.

"It… it was an accident!" he started to stammer once again as he struggled for words. "I mean, I never… I never meant …"

"Oh please, Weasley," Draco cut through him harshly, looking strangely smug and relaxed for someone tied to a chair against their will. "Do you really think that he cares if it was an accident? Do you honestly believe that means a damn to him? Because it doesn't, Weasley. He's going to find you – oh yes. He's going to find you, gut you, make a hat out of your insides and then hang your head over the fireplace in his office. And that, Weasley, is if you're lucky. However…" and here Draco trailed off with a disturbing look on his face, as though he was trying not to look too devious and failing spectacularly at it. "… I do believe he might be willing to overlook all this fuss if you do the right thing for all of us and simply let me go now…"

"Uh-uh, no way, Malfoy," said Ron, shaking his head immediately at that and refusing to fall for the bait as he pointed a finger in Malfoy's pointed face. "That's not an option. You're the only leverage I have right now so you and your pale arse are staying put, got that?"

However, Draco didn't.

Instead, the smarmy smile that was playing on his lips got even oilier and he let out a sneer so magnificent that it rivalled all the others he'd ever produced.

Ron had never had such an urge to punch anyone in his life.

"You're a fool, Weasel," Draco said with haughty amusement, lifting his chin and smirking some more at Ron. "I mean, are you really idiotic enough to think that running away from him isn't going to make him angrier? That Lucius isn't going to find whatever hellhole this is you've dragged us to and perform all types of torture on you? Face it, Weasley, you're buggered. And if you think I'm spending your last days in this dump when I could be doing far more interesting things, then you're obviously even more stupid than you look. Now let me go and I promise I'll only hex you twice."

Taking a moment to digest this speech, Ron stared at him.

"Twice?" he eventually said.

Draco nodded promptly in affirmation,

"I think that's a fair sum, yes."

"Right," said Ron, letting out a nod himself. He then chewed his lip. "You are so staying in that chair forever."

Draco narrowed his eyes. And here he was trying to negotiate.

"Weasley, I'm beginning to get impatient with you," he said irritably. "So, I'll put this as plainly as someone with your intellect can understand; if you don't let me out of this chair right now..."

However, Draco didn't get to finish that sentence.

A loud knock from the front door downstairs reverberated right up to where they were sitting and made them both freeze in their seats. That was until the second knock, which made Ron panic and jump to his feet and then the third, which made him let out a yelp and dive for his wand, which was lying on a rickety table.

Draco, who was still bound to his seat, and watching Ron with some amusement, was the first to speak as he broke into another wide, evil grin.

"Better not keep father waiting, Weasley," he said mockingly, smothering a laugh. "It'll only make him angrier…"

"Piss off, Malfoy!" Ron hissed, peering warily out the window. He then gulped at the crowd of huge looking people he saw at the door. "Oh God, I'm going to be murdered."

Draco rolled his eyes.

"Can we hurry up and get this over with?" he said with a bit of a whine. "I have tickets to see the _Shrieking Seers_ tonight and broom traffic at this time of the evening is murder..."

"_Murder!"_ Ron yelped almost hysterically. "You're speaking to me about murder, you little twat?"

"Well, seeing how you'll be acquainted with it in approximately two minutes, Weasley," Draco responded evilly, his teeth gleaming, "I thought you'd appreciate the reference."

"Why you little-" said Ron, grabbing Malfoy by the front of his robes.

However, before he could lift him up to have a clean aim of Malfoy's face, there was another knock on the door, this one louder and more persistent.

Ron froze again, his hand still fisted in the material of Malfoy's robes and his face looking terrified.

Malfoy's face, on the other hand, looked absolutely ecstatic.

"Well, go on, dear," he said in amusement as he batted his eyelashes, his smile blinding as he wiggled almost girlishly in Ron's hold. "You'd better let in our guests."


	5. A New Day is Dawning

**---------------------------------------------**

**And a New Day is Dawning…**

**---------------------------------------------**

Blaise Zabini was not a happy demon.

Not that he was usually very happy. Living in hell did put a dampener on one's morale after all. However, today he could safely say that he was as far from pleased as could be.

In fact, he was downright pissed – and that was a mighty feat considering how he was very used to being blasé about everything. After all, his face seemed almost constructed to look bored.

Pulling at the neck of his stifling robes and feeling sweat slipping down his back, Blaise gritted his teeth with annoyance, cursing the fact his skin was always piping hot. It was one of the things he hated most about being a demon. That and the fact he lived in a tiny apartment. Trust Hell to be so overcrowded.

Briefly thinking about the situation he was in as he walked his way to his destination, Blaise made a face and decided that it was all rather unfair. Why did _he_ have to be the one to relay the bad news back to Lucifer? And for that matter, why was _he_ the one who had to be assigned to this stupid case in the first place?

To be fair, Blaise knew exactly why he was chosen.

He had been a friend of Draco's. He was smart and capable. He was cold and ruthless. He was conniving. He was a very good dresser. And he was also the only person in his Department who hadn't completely refused to do it.

Turning into a dark corridor, he suddenly felt as though perhaps he should have put a bit more effort into the first time he rejected this mission. Maybe if he had he wouldn't be stuck here, waiting to tell Lucifer that somehow Hermione Granger had managed to outsmart him.

Blaise winced.

This was one conversation he _really _didn't want to have. But it's not like it was his fault – how could he have stopped her from making Draco unplottable? So unplottable that no matter what spell he cast, how much he looked or how many minions he had working overtime to locate him, he could not be found? It was as though the Malfoy had disappeared off the face of the earth which, according to Blaise, would have made it much easier to find him if he had – both Heaven and Hell were incredibly well organised.

"Pssst, Zabini, is that you?"

Stopping in his tracks, Blaise squeezed shut his eyes and swore in his head when he recognised the voice.

"Hey, I can hear that, you know," the voice said snottily.

Blaise let out a sigh. Opening his eyes, he stared across the dark hall at the demon that was standing just outside the door of Lucifer's room and scowling up at him. Blaise then rolled his eyes.

"What are you doing here, Smith?" he asked wearily. "If you've come up here again without Lucifer's permission…"

Zacharias Smith, who was still as tall, skinny and blond as he was when he was alive, snorted at that as he crossed his arms over his chest.

"Keep your horns on, Zabini," he said, emitting the same red glow that Blaise was though, Blaise noted with satisfaction, Smith's robes were not nearly as fashionable as his own. "I was sent to keep an eye on you. A lot of people are watching this case, you know."

Blaise did know. After all, it wasn't often that something this huge happened. Blaise, however, instead of saying that, merely smiled thinly.

"As much as I appreciate all your kind concern," he drawled, making sure to sound as unappreciative as he could, "it's highly unnecessary, Smith. Now, if that's all you care to share at present, I really must be…"

"If this doesn't pan out, Zabini, it'll be more than your head on a spike," said Smith, cutting through his words, his upturned nose lifted high and his expression irritatingly knowing.

Blaise, who had already turned towards Lucifer's door and had his hand on the doorknob, stopped in his tracks. Turning his head to look back at the blond, he frowned. He hated it when he was forced to speak to a Hufflepuff.

"What the heck is that supposed to mean?" he demanded.

But Smith wasn't looking smug any longer. He seemed to have gone from arrogant to nervous in a blink of an eye. He stepped forwards.

"Look, we're all counting on you to sort this out, Zabini," he said, leaning closer towards Blaise and looking rather shifty as he glanced from side to side, speaking in a low, quick voice. "If you mess up, we're all going to suffer for it. Snape, Bulstrode… shit, _everyone_ down under."

"I do know the consequences, Smith," said Blaise irritably, stepping away from his proximity haughtily and feeling rather galled at having the likes of Smith counting on him. Really, what was the underworld coming to?

Missing his look of disgust, Smith smiled grimly.

"Just making sure you know," he said simply. He then straightened his hat and fiddled with a crease on his shoulder before looked back at Blaise. "I'll check on you in a few days for an update. You'd better have good news for us, Zabini, or we're all screwed. Oh, and good luck. You're going to need it."

With one final grave looking expression, Smith clicked his fingers, burst into an explosion of flames and was gone.

Watching as the smoke subsided, Blaise stared at where Smith had been standing and eventually sneered.

"Fucking dramatic Hufflepuffs," he said with repulsion.

**---------------------------------------------  
**

When Ron pulled open the front door that was being persistently knocked upon with a threatening look on his face and his wand pointed in an intimidating manner, he was pretty sure this entire foolhardy move would end with him being killed.

However, after a minute of staring at a sea of huge, bearded-faced men who definitely were not Lucius Malfoy in any way, shape or form, Ron slowly, rather hesitantly, lowered his wand.

He then scratched his head.

"Um… hello…?" he said to the crowd, feeling rather confused.

The crowd of men who were standing at the door just stared back at him.

Ron tried again.

"…Uhhh… can I help you…?" he ventured nervously.

This was met with more staring.

Ron frowned. Wondering if shutting the door in their faces would be rude, he was just about to quietly slink back into the house and hope they wouldn't notice when someone finally broke the silence and spoke.

"This ere's Ted's barn," said the ruddy-faced man closest to Ron, who was dressed in earth-sullied dungarees, was resting on the handle of his spade and leisurely chewing at a blade of grass in his mouth like a cow grazing.

He then went back to staring at Ron with his small, dull round eyes.

"Oh," said Ron, not sure what to say to that.

"An' you ain't Ted," another man pointed out, his eyes suspicious and his beard wild. He then blinked slowly. "Ted's taller."

"_An'_ we 'eard screamin'," someone else piped up from somewhere in the middle of the crowd. "Go on, Chuck, tell 'im about the screamin'."

"We heard screamin'," clarified Chuck, the first man, also looking suspicious as he stilled chewing his grass. "An' we ain't s'posed ta hear screamin' neither."

Ron gulped. Malfoy and his stupid big mouth. And here he thought choosing to hide in an abandoned barn had been such a good idea…

"Err, listen, guys, there's been a sort of… misunderstanding…" Ron began tentatively through a weak smile as he lifted up his arms in imploration, stepping backwards and almost tripping over the doormat as he did.

"Arr, there has, young'un…" said Chuck nodding gravely, lifting up his shovel.

However, before Ron could bolt, cover his head or start hexing like a madman, a sharp voice and a beam of green light both exploded from just behind Ron's shoulder, the beam immediately stopping the group of men in their tracks and making their eyes glaze over.

Ron, who was gaping at the frozen pitchfork that was an inch away from taking out his eye, let his mouth hang open as Malfoy strode self-assuredly past him, looking rather pleased with himself. Smirking, he did a strange, girlish twirl of his wrist and immediately, the men all straightened into position like soldiers.

Malfoy then tsked.

"My, my, would you look at this sorry set of commoners?" he said, shaking his head and tutting in disappointment. "They almost make you look fashionable, Weasley. Step back, gentleman, your smell is turning my stomach."

Ron, whose brain was rather fuzzy since it was trying to process how Malfoy had got out of his binds, was expecting to see Malfoy get a good pummelling for that (and was secretly hoping for it, too). However, his jaw soon hit the ground when the men did exactly what Malfoy said, each taking a simultaneous step away from the barn.

"Now, drop those primitive weapons," Malfoy continued, looking delighted as he gave yet another flick of his wrist. And, once again, to Ron's great astonishment, the men did exactly as Malfoy said.

Ron blinked. Something was definitely screwy here.

"Malfoy, what the hell have you done to them…?"

"Why, nothing, silly Ronald," Draco said, cutting through his words and now grinning disturbing. He then turned back to the men. "Now everyone bow down to me and chant about how handsome I am."

It was only once each and every one of the men actually got down on their knees – some with quite some difficulty – that it suddenly hit Ron like a boulder to the brain.

"You've used Imperius on them!" he gasped out in dismay but his voice was soon drowned out by an uproar of,

"Draco is handsome…!"

"Draco is wonderful…!"

"Draco is a Saint…!"

"Draco is a genius…!"

"Draco is…"

"A PRAT!" Ron howled out, his hands over his ears due to all the noise and his face bright red with anger. "TAKE IT OFF THEM, MALFOY! TAKE IT OFF!"

"Awww, but why?" Draco pouted.

"MALFOY, YOU CRAZY BASTARD, THIS IS _SO _ILLEGAL! TAKE IT OFF!"

"But they're enjoying it…"

"MALFOY!"

"What, do you want them to bow to you instead?"

"TAKE IT OFF!"

"We can take turns…"

"MALFOY, IF YOU DON'T TAKE IT OFF RIGHT NOW…!"

"Oh, alright, alright, you bloody pauper," Draco muttered irritably, before turning back to the group, and letting out a sigh. "Okay, boys, it's been fun but I'm afraid all good things must come to an end. Clear off, the lot of you, and don't come back again or I'll set Weasley on you. And he's a great flaming poufter. Now _go_."

And, with one last flick of his wand, Draco lifted the spell.

Immediately, the glaze went out of the men's eyes and their blank expressions were replaced with confusion as they slowly began blinking dully, pondering why they were hunched over on the ground, both their foreheads and knees covered in dirt. Rather disorientated, they clumsily got back to their feet, bumping into one another as they stumblingly made their way down the hill the barn was situated on top of, the occasional man falling over and rolling down.

As the figures soon became tiny little dots, Draco turned back to Ron, looking exceedingly proud of himself.

"I think that went rather well, don't you?" he said rather cheerfully.

Ron replied by trying to punch him in the face. Ducking the move easily since he'd been expecting it for a while now, Draco smirked again and wagged his finger reprovingly.

"Now, now, Weasley, is that the way to treat the man who just saved your life?"

Letting out a growl, Ron leapt for Draco again, this time managing to get hold of him as he fisted his hands around his collar and pulled him close enough for their noses to touch.

"Now you listen to me, you little nancy boy, and you listen to me good," he spat, his face crimson and the vein in his forehead throbbing in such a way that Draco eyed it worryingly. "Stop using Imperius on people, stop being such a fucking arse and stop telling people I'm a pouf!"

"Well, if you weren't such a shirtlifter, I wouldn't have to say it!" Draco hissed out, although his face was beginning to go blue as Ron only held tighter onto his throat. It didn't stop Draco from sneering at him even more though as he rasped out, "You're still pining over Potter like the little Weasel you are. Pathetic really, getting a hard on over a corpse. But I suppose you've got more chance with him now that he's snuffed it. Can't exactly push you out of the coffin, can he- OW!"

"You better shut your mouth about Harry, Malfoy!" Ron growled, his nails digging into Draco's pale neck. "If you know what's good for you, you'll shut that stupid mouth of yours right fucking now!"

"Or what Weasley?" Draco spat out maliciously, still managing to smirk despite struggling for breath.

"Or I'll shut you up, you wanker!" Ron retorted, slamming Draco against the front door so the back of the blond's head impacted with the wood, his hands still tight around Draco's throat.

However, Draco only continued to smile nastily, gasping for breath as he did so.

"Oh yeah, Weasley?" he hissed softly, licking his blue lips as he stopped struggling for a second, just staring into Ron's eyes intently as Ron stared just and fixedly back. "And _how _exactly are you going to shut me up, hmmm?"

**---------------------------------------------**

"They're going to kiss… Oh God, they're going to kiss… I just know it… " Hermione was chanting, her fingers pressed against her mouth in excitement and her eyes bright and expectant as she hid within the large hydrangea bush just metres away from the two sparring young men. She then turned to the large, rustling rose bush beside her. "Harry, Harry… I think this is it!"

The rose bush groaned audibly.

"Just tell me when it's over," it moaned, sounding nauseated.

"Oh, Harry, stop being such a killjoy," Hermione rebuked.

Honestly, he should have been happy. After all the effort they had gone through, begging Gabriel for help, getting one over on Zabini, finally finding Ron and searching out bushes big enough for them to hide in, Hermione thought he'd be a little more cheerful.

_Boys, _she thought. She'd never understand them.

"Is it over yet?" Harry's muffled voice asked from beside her.

Craning her head to check if the coast was clear, Hermione took in the scene Ron and Malfoy were providing and soon frowned at the outcome as the boys let one another go and continued to quibble as they shoved each other irritably back into the house.

"Oh fudge," Hermione said in disappointment as they door closed after them.

"Where?" said Harry, popping his rose-petaled head out for a peek.

Ignoring him, Hermione disentangled herself from the hydrangea bush (with much trouble due to that hair of hers) and, covered in dirt-stains and twigs and leaves, tried to peer through the nearest window of the barn by tiptoeing and craning her head.

Catching a glimpse of Malfoy sprawling himself out on the living room sofa and looking smug while Ron looked confused, Hermione frowned again.

"_Now_ what could they be talking about?" she wondered aloud, frustrated.

---------------------------------------------

"Well, now that the preliminary fight is over – how much ransom have you actually negotiated, Weasley?"

Ron stared at Draco as though he had suddenly sprouted two heads. He then did what he usually did when he was confused by something.

He scratched his head.

Weren't they about to kill each other just a second ago?

"Huh?" said Ron, hoping that would explain something.

Draco rolled his eyes.

"_Ransom_, Weasel," he said, sounding exasperated, as though he were explaining the alphabet to a fifty-year-old. "You know, the reason people kidnap one another in the first place?"

Ron blinked at that, looking rather thrown.

"I… Well, I hadn't thought about money…"

"Well, obviously," Draco scoffed, throwing his legs over the armrest of the sofa and getting himself comfortable against the pillows. "Asking a Weasley to think about money is like asking Longbottom to just… well, _think_."

Ron narrowed his eyes at that.

"Lay off the Neville jokes, Malfoy," he said tersely. "And, for that matter, lay off on the jokes about my family, too."

"Weasley, calling your family poor is a fact, not a joke," Malfoy explained patiently, languidly stretching his arms and placing them behind his head as a cushion. "Although, I must say, it sure is funny…"

Ron's growl was positively feral.

"You are so asking to be put in that chair again," he threatened fiercely, moving forward menacingly. Draco wasn't affected, however, as he merely looked on with lazy amusement.

"Well, that's not much of a threat considering that I can escape out of it," Draco retorted arrogantly, throwing Ron a look that clearly said he was inept.

But Ron ignored the look. Instead, he suddenly pursed his lips and looked at Malfoy shrewdly, as though he had never seen him before.

"How?" he asked, his brows furrowed.

Draco snorted.

"I'm not a common Indian, Weasley – how _what?"_

Momentarily ignoring that blatantly racist remark, Ron reminded himself to act on it another time. So instead, he decided to push his previous line of questioning and inquired,

"How come you can get out of binding charms so easily?"

"Because you charm like a girl," Draco quipped snottily.

"Yeah, at least I don't look like one," Ron shot back defensively. Then glaring at Malfoy for distracting him, "And stop lying to me, I charm fine. Fred and George taught me how well enough – what's up with that?"

Malfoy didn't answer. Deliberately ignoring Ron's question, he looked about the room in distaste instead.

"I always imagined that your mother's house looked something like this, you know," he tried to say condescendingly.

But Ron didn't bite. He just glared at him and crossed his arms.

It was enough to make Draco crack.

"I've been kidnapped a few times before, alright, you nosy bastard?" he eventually snapped, bristling sensitively like an angry cat and glaring loathingly at Ron. "So I've had plenty of practise untying binds. Happy now, you inquisitive shit?"

Ron took a moment to digest this, minus the expletives.

"What's 'a few times before'?" he asked slowly.

"A sentence, you plebeian."

Ron stared at him some more.

"Ugh, _four_, alright!" Draco conceded in frustration, running a hand through his hair in irritation and making it stick up with static.

Ron took a moment to digest this, too.

"… why?"

"For the pleasure of my company," Draco said dryly. Then, when Ron continued to look at him in confusion he let out a curse and bellowed, "For money, you idiot! Like the money we should be asking my father for."

"Excuse me - _we?" _Ron spluttered unintelligibly.

"Oh, come on, Weasley." Draco smirked. Ron cursed. The little ferret was back to his smarmy self. "You didn't really think I wouldn't try to profit out of this little situation, did you? I say we ask for seventy million galleons."

"Oh, sod off, Malfoy, no one'll pay that much for you," Ron said, barking out a laugh. "And I don't care about the money. I didn't do this for _money_, you prat. I'm a wanted criminal, you need to tell your dad to forget about all this!"

Malfoy merely sneered at that, filing his nails again as though it was of utmost importance.

"And why would I do that?" he asked, briefly looking up from his cuticles. "Out of the goodness of my heart? Fuck off, Weasley. What's in it for me? I'm not staying with you here for nothing."

Ron opened his mouth. He thought about yelling some more, telling Malfoy he didn't want him here anyway, maybe going for the good old 'knock Malfoy out' strategy.

However, he didn't do any of those things.

He _needed_ Malfoy.

It was a thought pained him and made Ron, a boy who hadn't cried since early childhood, want to bawl with the injustice of it all but nevertheless he _really_ needed the pompous, evil little wanker. How else would he get Lucius 'King of the Ministry' Malfoy to not behead him on sight?

And so Ron thought. And closed his mouth before a bug flew in.

"… If I ask for seventy million galleons…" he asked Draco, a contemplative look on his face, "…get the ransom then split it with you, will you stop being such an annoying arse and speak to your dad for me?"

Draco lifted a brow. He then tossed his head and tried to look imperious. Ron held himself back from rolling his eyes.

"_Split _it with me?" Draco scoffed, lifting his chin. "I think not, poor boy."

Ron clenched his fists to stop them running away from him and flying into Malfoy's nose. He really didn't know why he bothered bargaining with the spoilt twat in the first place.

"Don't push your luck, Malfoy," he snarled, leaning forward so his fists dug into the armrest of the sofa Malfoy was lazing on. "We'll split the money 50/50, you'll talk to your dad and then we'll – hopefully – never have to see each other again. Deal?"

It took a while for Malfoy to say it but when he did, he did so through pursed lips and a somewhat pensive expression.

"Fine," he said.

"Fine?" Ron repeated dully, as though he had misheard. He hadn't expected the little tosser to agree so easily.

"I said '_fine'_, already!" Draco snapped irritably, waving a hand at Ron as though trying to bat him away like a fly.

For some reason, Ron took that as a good sign.

"Okay, fine," said Ron, feeling rather upbeat himself by witnessing Malfoy's sourness. It put him in a surprisingly good mood. He even let out a grin. "Right, so, now what do we do?"

"Now we write the ransom," said Draco, still sounding bad-tempered as he glared at Ron. "Although we'd better leave that to me, Weasel, since your grammar is barely suitable for a shopping list."

Leaving that last insult hanging in the air, Malfoy sauntered his way passed Ron haughtily to rifle through Farmer Ted's drawers for writing supplies.

Gritting his teeth as Malfoy purposely hit him as he passed, Ron, rubbing his shoulder, decided to let that slide. However, that was mainly due to the small worry that had been unconsciously niggling at the back of his mind for a while now, which suddenly gnawed its way to the forefront.

"… Err, Malfoy, are you sure your dad's going to buy all this?" Ron suddenly asked in a hesitant voice.

Throwing him a smirk over his shoulder after eyeing a ballpoint pen in horrified curiosity, Malfoy tossed the thing rudely aside and looked as smug and relaxed as a person possibly could.

"Oh come on, Weasley, stop being such a wimp," he said in amused exasperation, his grey eyes glittering. "Besides, it's not like he's all-knowing now, is it?"

**---------------------------------------------**

"… Sir?" Blaise said tentatively as he opened the door, wrinkling his nose at the strange concoction of potions that sizzled up his nose. "Sir, are you here?"

Shivering as his voice echoed around the vast black room, Blaise hesitantly glanced about his surroundings. The huge, blazing hearth to his right was the only thing in the room that he could really see, it's cold green flames providing little light as timid shadows flickered hither and thither around him, like demonic lizards crawling over the walls.

The occasional one fell across his person and he jumped slightly as he felt it burn lightly through his clothes.

"Do not mind them, Blaise, they merely like to play."

Blaise immediately dropped down to his knees, his head bowed and his eyes staring at the floor.

"I do not mind them, my liege," he assured hastily, his gaze still fixed on the black marble, even as he heard footsteps approach him and a pair of immaculately dressed feet stop right by his eyes. Blaise felt a looming shadow fall upon him, this one burning him a hundred times more than the previous others had.

He gulped and decided to get it over with.

"Sir… Sir, I have some bad news…" Blaise stuttered, sweat pouring down his back. However, before he could say anything else, provide any more information about Draco's unplottable location and Hermione Granger's skill at charming, Lucifer said, very softly,

"The Tilsbury Farm, Hatfield, Hertfordshire."

Blaise stopped immediately. Ever so slowly, he lifted his head to catch his employer's eye.

"… you… you found Draco, sir?" he asked, his voice shaky with hope.

Lucifer smiled, turning his head slightly so the hood he was wearing cascaded down to his shoulders and his platinum blond head shone, even brighter than the flames in the hearth.

"Blaise," said Lucius Malfoy, tutting as his pale grey eyes gleamed. "Did you really think I couldn't find my only son?"


End file.
